The ManicaPost
Samuel Kadungure
Senior Reporter
MEMBER of House of Assembly (MP) for Makoni South, Cde Misheck Mataranyika and two ZANU PF officials cheated death by a whisker when their campaign vehicle slipped and rolled thrice before plunging into Tamuka Dam in the Mt Zonwe area last week.
The legislator was travelling with Cdes Kenneth Chaparapata (Makoni DCC member) and Blessing Dzakuraswa (a district youth chair), who were the first to break the back passenger windows of the submerged Isuzu double cab vehicle and escape to safety.
No one was injured in the mishap, which occurred on March 13 around 8pm.
A retrieval mission of the submerged vehicle took two days as the ground was wet due to Tropical Storm Freddy-induced rains.
It is alleged that last year a fishmonger died on the same spot the car landed in the dam.
“The incident happened in one of the three wards allotted to the constituency following the delimitation of wards and constituencies by Zimbabwe Electoral Commission. We had gone to meet and introduce ourselves to the leadership there.
“This was our first time to go there and as we approached the scene of the accident, our car swerved on the left, and I tried to apply brakes, but it did not stop. I tried to control it, but to no avail, and it was accelerating due to the slippery ground. It rolled thrice, plunged into the dam and landed on its wheels with the three of us inside. The doors locked and my colleagues managed to break the back window and got out of the car first. I was the last to escape and I started swimming, albeit towards the dam spillway. My colleagues who had surveyed the area whistled and shouted that I was swimming in the wrong direction, otherwise it would have been a disaster,” said Cde Mataranyika.
They then summoned a recovery vehicle to retrieve the car, but the mission took longer than expected due to the wet ground.
“We summoned my driver to come and take us home. The vehicle remained in the water for two days as the ground was too wet for the retrieval mission and it is now in Harare,” he said.
