adminGilbert Munetsi in BATTLEFIELDS
THE question that still haunts me, days after that tragic accident which has now claimed eight lives of Dynamos fans, is how many of those who perished would have been saved if everyone had given a helping hand. Instead, and that is what is torturing my soul, a lot of those who arrived at the scene, shortly after the accident, decided to turn themselves into camerapersons shooting a movie or a documentary.
I should know because I was one of the first people on the scene, shortly after the accident, and couldn’t understand how much we have changed as a people.
From a people that used to be united in helping each other, when such a tragedy strikes, to ones who only want to capture the images of the dead and the dying on our mobile phones.
For what I wonder?
To tell our colleagues that we were the first to capture the images, when we could have helped save a life, and how does that comfort us?
Just minutes after the Iveco bus (registration number ADY 9742) veered off the road and fell on its side, and there were people crying for help.
I could watch as a number of people chose to take pictures on their mobile phones rather than lend a helping hand.
Where has conscience and humanity gone to?
I recall during the height of xenophobia, a photojournalist for an international media organisation who had captured a photograph of a foreigner in a flame later committed suicide because he simply could not battle the demons that stalked him after that.
Months after his image made the front pages of many newspapers around the world, that photojournalist was battling his conscience which told him he should have helped doused the fire instead of capturing the image.
If he had doused the fire, maybe, the man he captured with his camera lenses, crying out for help, could have been saved but, instead, he chose to make him a statistic of the brutality that was going on in South Africa then.
The other thing I also noted is the slow rate with which our emergency services react to such situations.
Even if there are logistical challenges being experienced, two hours to attend to an accident that has happened less than 50km both ways of Kadoma and Kwekwe is a bit too long if we are intent on saving lives.
If this can happen on our main highway, the one that connects our two biggest cities, Harare and Bulawayo, what about those in remote areas?
If it is lack for knowledge of whom to get in touch with, then a vigorous advertising campaign to make people aware of the contacts for ambulance, fire brigade and police would help, especially from the civic organisations that claim to represent the vulnerable travelling public and get funding for that cause.
The accident happened around 11am and help only cane around 1pm.
It’s not the statistics of the dead that we should be quick with, but the lives that can probably be saved.
But there are some saints out there, great citizens who are always ready to go the extra mile to provide a helping hand, and that is comforting.
The chairman of local football club, Tongogara FC, Munyaradzi Marimbini, who is a Dynamos fan, dedicated his side’s 1-0 win against Chrome Stars to the deceased supporters.
“I am short for words to express how I feel as I was one of the first people to be at the scene and assist with logistics to have the injured and bodies ferried to Kadoma and Kwekwe general hospitals,” he told The Herald.
“We are with them (families), Dynamos and the entire national football community in this time of grief,” said Marimbindi, who is also the Officer Commanding 53 Battalion at Battlefields.
Good as it was, the police spokesperson’s advice for people to desist from purchasing second-hand tyres is quite noble, but on my way to Battlefields, I lost count of the number of road blocks mounted along the highway.
If really they were there to check the roadworthiness of the vessels carrying passengers, I suppose the faulty tyres on that bus would have been detected and condemned.
I am not ruling out the fact that even new tyres can also burst too.
On Sunday, the weather conditions around Battlefields appeared to be mourning too.
It was very cold and grey, as if in grief following the accident which claimed those Dynamos fans who were on their way to support their team in a league match against Chapungu in Gweru.
Though the Harare-Bulawayo Highway has been upgraded and there are no potholes, fatal accidents continue to claim lives on this route and on March 3, 30 lives were lost in a Pfochez bus accident less than 90km from the recent one.
Online Reporter