By Gabriel Manyati
There is something profoundly unsettling about a country mourning dozens of people drowned in a ferry disaster while senior figures in society contemplate rituals as a response to catastrophe. Zimbabwe has every right to grieve, to pray and to draw comfort from its traditions. But when tragedy strikes, the first questions of a functioning state should be brutally practical: Was the vessel seaworthy? Was it overloaded? Were safety regulations enforced? Were warnings ignored? Was the crew adequately trained? Who inspected the ferry, and who authorised it to operate?
These questions matter because the Mbuya Nehanda disaster was not an inexplicable act of nature. The ferry, designed to carry 90 passengers, was reportedly carrying far more than that when it capsized amid heavy winds. Survivors also described the vessel taking on water and passengers pleading for it to turn back. The death toll subsequently rose dramatically as more bodies were recovered.
Against this background, reports that First Lady Auxillia Mnangagwa called on traditional leaders to perform rituals to prevent catastrophes raise a much bigger question than whether one political figure believes in traditional spirituality. The question is what happens when spiritual explanations begin occupying the same space as public policy.
The controversy stems from the First Lady’s own words. Speaking in Kariba, Mrs Mnangagwa urged traditional leaders to reflect on what she suggested was a deeper cultural dimension to the disaster. “Mune tsika dzinoda kutariswa nemagariro. Lake ratsamwa rikazotora nekuzotoresesa. Dutu ngarichidzikama,” she said. She also called on Christians to unite in prayer as the nation mourned the victims. Whether interpreted literally, symbolically or culturally, the remarks inevitably invite scrutiny because they appear to frame a modern transport disaster not solely as a matter of safety, regulation and accountability, but also through the lens of traditional spiritual belief.
This is where the concept of syncretism becomes important. Syncretism refers to the blending, merging or coexistence of beliefs and practices from different religious or spiritual traditions. In Zimbabwe, where Christianity exists alongside deeply rooted African traditional beliefs, the boundaries can sometimes become blurred.
There is nothing inherently wrong with respecting traditional culture. Traditional leaders have important roles in preserving heritage, resolving community disputes and maintaining social cohesion. Indeed, Auxillia Mnangagwa’s programmes involving traditional courts and cultural values have explicitly promoted the preservation of Zimbabwean heritage.
The problem begins when cultural respect becomes an argument for allowing supernatural explanations to displace evidence.
A Christian government can pray after a disaster. Christians themselves believe in divine intervention. But prayer is fundamentally different from suggesting that a ferry disaster requires traditional rituals to prevent another catastrophe. That distinction matters, particularly when the same political establishment presents itself as committed to modernisation, scientific development and institutional governance.
The issue, therefore, is not whether African traditional beliefs are primitive or whether Christianity is superior. Such an argument would be both intellectually lazy and culturally insulting. The real issue is whether the state should make decisions about matters of public safety on the basis of claims that cannot be empirically tested.
Zimbabwe has been here before.
In 2007, when the country was suffering devastating fuel shortages, traditional healer and spirit medium Rotina Mavhunga convinced senior government officials that diesel was mysteriously emerging from a rock at Maningwa Hills near Chinhoyi. A Cabinet taskforce was dispatched to investigate the extraordinary claim. Officials reportedly accepted that the diesel was real, while government resources, vehicles and other benefits were provided in connection with the supposed discovery. The extraordinary saga eventually unravelled, and Mavhunga was convicted of fraud. Evidence presented in court showed that diesel had been deliberately piped into the rock.
Think about the symbolism of that episode.
A government confronting a genuine fuel crisis had access to economists, geologists, engineers, scientists, petroleum experts and intelligence officers. Yet senior officials entertained the possibility that Zimbabwe’s fuel crisis might be solved by diesel mysteriously emerging from a rock.
That is more than an amusing historical anecdote. It is a warning about what happens when desperation overwhelms scepticism.
People become susceptible to supernatural explanations when conventional explanations have failed them. When institutions are dysfunctional, miracles become attractive. When governments cannot solve problems, magical solutions can acquire political appeal. When citizens are frightened, someone promising an explanation can become more persuasive than someone demanding evidence.
This is why superstition in government is particularly dangerous.
An ordinary citizen may believe that ancestors caused a misfortune. That is a matter of personal belief. A government minister doing so is different because ministers possess institutional power. Their beliefs can influence policy, expenditure and public priorities.
There is also a dangerous accountability dimension.
If a ferry sinks because of ancestral displeasure, who is responsible? If a ritual was neglected, does the transport regulator escape scrutiny? Does the captain’s decision to continue sailing disappear from the conversation? Does overloading become irrelevant? Does poor maintenance cease to matter?
This is the danger of supernaturalising institutional failure. It can turn a problem with identifiable human causes into an amorphous spiritual mystery.
A ferry does not become overloaded because a spirit is angry. An ageing vessel does not become unsafe because ancestors have been offended. A failed engine does not require a ritual to explain its mechanical condition.
It requires maintenance.
And if somebody knowingly allowed an unsafe vessel to carry more passengers than it was designed for, that person requires investigation, not ritual cleansing.
There is an even deeper contradiction here. Zimbabwe’s political establishment frequently presents itself as simultaneously Christian, African and modern. President Emmerson Mnangagwa has publicly invoked God while also placing considerable emphasis on traditional institutions and cultural heritage. That combination is not necessarily contradictory. African Christianity itself has developed in societies where indigenous culture remains influential.
But syncretism becomes problematic when the boundaries between cultural identity, religious faith and supernatural causation become so blurred that government loses its epistemological compass.
A modern state can accommodate traditional leaders without becoming governed by supernatural claims. It can respect ancestors without asking ancestors to perform the work of engineers. It can preserve cultural ceremonies while demanding scientific explanations for physical phenomena.
That distinction is crucial.
Traditional leaders can help communities cope with grief. Churches can provide pastoral care. Families can observe mourning traditions. Communities can pray. None of these things should prevent the state from commissioning an independent investigation into the Lake Kariba disaster.
In fact, the two can coexist perfectly well. The bereaved may ask why God allowed this to happen. Investigators must ask why the ferry sank. Those are different questions. Zimbabwe’s tragedy is that we too often confuse them.
The deeper problem is not simply superstition. It is an institutional culture in which accountability can be displaced by symbolism. We see it when politicians invoke destiny instead of performance, miracles instead of policy and spiritual explanations instead of administrative responsibility.
The diesel-from-a-rock episode should have permanently embarrassed the state into developing a culture of scepticism. Every extraordinary claim should trigger extraordinary scrutiny. Instead, it demonstrated how easily desperation can open the doors of government to people making extraordinary claims.
The Lake Kariba disaster should therefore produce the opposite response from ritualising catastrophe. It should produce audits, inspections, parliamentary questions, independent investigations and prosecutions where negligence is established.
Zimbabweans are free to believe whatever they wish. They can be Christian, traditionalist, both, neither or something more complicated. That is the beauty of a free society.
But government has a different obligation. The state must be evidence-led even when its citizens are faith-led.
When tragedy strikes, responsible government should begin with the things it can inspect, measure and prove: the hull, the engine, the passenger manifest, the maintenance records, the weather reports, the safety equipment, the regulatory paperwork and the decisions made by those entrusted with human lives.
Only after those questions have been answered should anyone be tempted to ask whether the spirits have something to say.
Otherwise, we risk building a state that possesses modern ministries, modern technology and modern infrastructure while retaining a pre-modern approach to causation and accountability.
Zimbabwe cannot ritualise its way out of institutional decay. The dead deserve more than prayers. They deserve answers.
Note*This is an opinion article and the views, opinions, interpretations and conclusions expressed herein are solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect, represent or constitute the views, opinions or official position of National Interest News.
