Zimbabwe’s Roads Claim 19 Lives in One Week

ZimNow Reporter

From Mazowe to Mutare, Zimbabwe’s highways turned deadly over the week of April 11 to 17, 2025, with at least 19 people killed and injured in a string of horrific traffic accidents. The accidents—mostly involving overloaded or speeding vehicles—expose ongoing road safety challenges on the country’s major routes.

Crash Timeline and Statistics

Date	Location	Vehicle Type	Fatalities	Injuries
11 April	Harare-Bulawayo Road (63 km peg)	Toyota Caldina vs Hino truck	4	4
12 April	Mazowe-Centenary Road	Toyota Probox	1	0
14 April	Masvingo-Mutare Road (293 km peg)	Toyota Wish	4	7
17 April	Gweru-Zvishavane Road (20 km peg)	Toyota Regius ACE omnibu	4	7
17 April	Harare-Chirundu Road (214 km peg)	Haulage Truck vs Nissan NV150	6	0
Total			19	18

Patterns and Key Insights:

Highways Are Hotspots— Every crash occurred along major national highways—Harare-Bulawayo, Masvingo-Mutare, Gweru-Zvishavane, and Harare-Chirundu—pointing to systemic issues with driver behavior and highway safety enforcement.

Overloaded Vehicles a Recurring Factor— Multiple crashes involved vehicles with more passengers than legally allowed, including a Toyota Wish carrying 11 passengers and a Toyota Caldina with six passengers. In both cases, vehicles overturned or lost control.

Public Servants and Notables Not Spared—Constablee Amanda Katanha, a police officer, was struck and killed in Mazowe after knocking off duty. Among the Harare-Bulawayo fatalities was Tatenda Pinjisi (33), a well-known musician.

Peak Casualties on 17 April- Two separate major crashes occurred on April 17. In the morning a crash on the Gweru-Zvishavane Road resulted in 4 dead and 7 injured. At midday along Harare-Chirundu Road, 6 died in a collision involving a haulage truck. This single day accounted for 52% of the total fatalities in the week.

Gwanda Rail Crash

Although not a road crash, a railway accident added to the week’s transport tragedies when 13 people got injured in a goods train on April 18 on the Bulawayo-Beitbridge Railway Line.

National Dialogue Needed

There were many social media emotional outbursts linking politics to the road crashes. Preliminary indications show that most road crashes could have been prevented with safer driver behavior, while more effective policing controls for unauthorized transporters and overloading could have reduced the numbers of lives lost and injuries.

The terrible terrible stats of this week underscore the urgent need for enhanced highway patrols and tougher and sustained enforcement of mushikashika operations. The time is now for structural interventions, not just reactive policing. Zimbabwe urgently needs a national dialogue on road safety education.