According to the Marketing Officer for Buhera District Council, Lloyd Makenya, the area has one of the largest concentrations of stone-built monuments in the country.
Makeya said the Buhera cluster comprises such sites as Matendera, Kagumbudzi Muchuchu and Chironga, Chiwona and Gombe ruins.
“Structurally the ruins have some remarkable features similar to Great Zimbabwe and date back to the 16th and 17th centuries AD. Buhera also has a wide distribution of beautiful hunter-gatherer rock art sites,” said Makenya.
The Matendera Ruins are a replica of the Zimbabwe Ruins with an extensive and impressive horse-shoe shaped enclosure located on a low lying dwala south of Buhera. The site is the biggest in the district and has architectural features similar to Great Zimbabwe.
Gombe Ruins are located on a low hill north of Gudo Business Centre along the Murambinda-Birchenough Bridge Road. Several findings of decorated and un-decorated ceramics, glass and metal beads were excavated from the site. The houses with thick clay walls are uniquely Zimbabwean.
To date the council has teamed up with the South African town of Makhado Local Municipality to woo tourists from across the Limpopo into the district.
With an estimated population of 250,000, Buhera District is one of the driest regions in Zimbabwe and is also the second poorest. There is very little employment in the area and most locals are subsistence farmers.
“We are developing tourism as another way of raising revenue. This is in line with our mission of facilitating and coordinating the provision of services in order to improve the living standards of people in the area,” said Makenya.
Post published in: News
good information but the ministry of tourism should be engaged for these ruins to be visited by both loca
l and international tourists