Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday Life Reporter
THE road to the Chilojo Cliffs at Gonarezhou National Park in Masvingo Province is not for the faint-hearted.
The twists and turns on this stretch of earth leave one unsure of their bearings, wondering, which direction is north or south.
Just as one thinks it is all smooth sailing, they find themselves confronted with hills that seem to explode from nowhere, giving a thorough examination of the driving skills of whoever might be at the wheel.
From a safari car, the view from some of these hills is spectacular. Far below, the waters of the Runde River seem to flow at a snail’s pace nine months into what has been a very dry year.
Thomas Chinyanyani
As one drives further into the park, they come across all manner of animals. They cross paths with elephants that have laid waste to hundreds of trees over the years, marauding through the forest as they search for delicious tree sap. Gonarezhou means “the place for elephants” and from the trees littering the ground, it is clear to see why.
Vultures circle overhead, indicating their intention to take part in a prospective buffet if a fresh kill has been made nearby.
There are no sightings of lions but their footprints on the wind-battered soils indicate that the king of the jungle is lurking somewhere in the thick forests.
The entire scene is bewitching for a tourist but sitting on the driver’s side of the safari car, Thomas Chinyanyani is not altogether enchanted by it.
He has an eye on a worrying sight. On the banks of the Runde, he has spotted a buffalo and this has piqued his interest. To the ordinary eye, this is merely another animal seeking to quench its thirst after journeying around the park.
However, Chinyanyani, a guide at Gonarezhou, knows better. “I saw a sub-adult male on the north-western side of the park, perhaps between two and three years old,” he tells another member of his team later on.
“It was alone, so I am assuming that maybe it is sick. You should check on it.”
With just a glance from his binoculars, Chinyanyani had seemingly not only managed to diagnose the buffalo’s condition but also its age.
This is daily life for the guide, whose life seems to have been intertwined with the fate of the animals at Zimbabwe’s second-biggest national park.
Born and bred in Mahenye, a village inhabited mostly by Shangani people on the borders of the north-eastern boundary of Gonarezhou, Chinyanyani recalls a time when, as a young lad, he did not have a great love for some of the park’s four-legged inhabitants.
“As a youngster growing up near the park, things were not always easy. It was tough because some people were hostile towards the animals because they felt that animals stray into their space and destroy crops or eat and kill domestic animals like cattle and goats.
“However, these perceptions have changed over the years because people are getting jobs from taking care of these same animals that they once saw as enemies. Once people started benefitting directly and indirectly, they started changing their attitude towards animals,” he told Sunday Life during a media tour organised by the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority.
In 2007, Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (ZPWMA) invited Frankfurt Zoological Society (FZS) to help restore the park, with FZS initially supporting anti-poaching patrols, better training, and improved infrastructure. Ten years later, FZS and ZPWMA strengthened their partnership by forming the new Gonarezhou Conservation Trust (GCT) to manage the park.
From such partnerships and initiatives, the likes of Chinyanyani switched from being bystanders watching life unfold at the national park to active participants seeking to save the lives of animals they once saw as sworn enemies.
“Relations between the park and local communities were sour a long time back but now, they are very good. I am a local community member myself.
I am from Mahenya and my presence shows the improvements that have been made in relations between the park and local people. Gonarezhou also employs a large number of people like me, who are from the local community. I would say three-quarters of the people who work here are from nearby communities,” he said.
Elephants roaming the National Park
Whenever he goes back to Mahenya, Chinyanyani said he takes it as his duty to educate the local population on the importance of looking after the animals and plants in the national park.
“We are spreading the gospel of conservation back to the community whenever I go back. I make sure that I spread that message to my people because we need to take care of the wildlife.
We are benefitting directly and indirectly through tourism because when people come here sometimes, they buy things from the community,” he said.
It has been a long journey for Gonarezhou, which saw its rhino population decimated in the 1940s and 1994 due to rampant poaching.
“In 2021, we introduced 28 black rhinos and have 38 rhinos now, which shows that they are doing well. We do get poachers, especially those from neighbouring communities. They mostly come here to poach for fish and other small animals for subsistence. It is mostly subsistence poaching, with people killing animals for eating.
“Some time back, we had problems with the Bemba people from our neighbouring Mozambique but ever since we struck an agreement with the Zoological Society of Mozambique, poaching incidents became low,” he said.
Despite all efforts, a few lives are still lost to human-wildlife conflict. “There are still incidents of human-wildlife conflict because when people come here to do some poaching, they get bitten by crocodiles or even killed by elephants.
Gonarezhou authorities also make sure to arrest those who are doing any kind of poaching but sometimes, a few people end up in spaces dominated by animals and conflicts ensue,” he said.
Even though he grew up on the doorsteps of the park, Chinyanyani is still in awe of its beauty. He knows by heart the dimensions of the iconic Chilojo Cliffs, which lie at the heart of the park.
He speaks with pride when he recalls that these cliffs, famed for their “changing face” which shifts when exposed to morning or evening light, once graced a Zimbabwean $10 note.
It is this beauty that he wishes to hold on to and preserve. “Chilojo means the inside of an elephant’s mouth. The cliffs stretch for about 14km and from the riverbed to the top of the cliffs it is about 180m.
They are part of the reason tourists come to Gonarezhou. They want to see their beauty. No one can say when the cliffs were formed but we can assume that they were made years ago through agents of erosion like wind and rain which act upon the rock.
The rock is red sandstone and because of this, some parts are stronger while others are weaker. The weaker parts are the ones that are eroded which in the end give us this stunning view,” he said.
