When Nostalgia Becomes Policy, 2025 Sanganai Tourism Expo Highlights Decay In Transport System

By Shingirai Vambe

The launch of a plane and a train service during the 2025 Sanganai/Hlanganani World Tourism Expo in Mutare was meant to showcase Zimbabwe’s potential as a tourism hub. Instead, it exposed glaring cracks in the country’s development strategy and underscored the frustrations of ordinary citizens who view such gestures as hollow spectacles designed to impress international visitors rather than improve daily life.

Once upon a time, flights from Harare to Mutare and passenger trains linking the two cities were not novelties, they were routine services. Reliable and affordable transport was part of the fabric of a thriving economy. Today, those systems exist largely in memory. Airstrips that once served the people have been repurposed for diamond miners, political elites, and the well-connected few. For the ordinary Zimbabwean, struggling to pay rent, school fees, and medical bills, boarding a plane or a luxury train is a far-fetched dream.

“People are celebrating things that should have been part of everyday life,” Taurai Machisa told The Post on Sunday. “These flights were already there in the 1970s. What is there to celebrate when what was once standard has become a rare occasion reserved for the privileged?”

Theresa Kapuma, a Mutare resident, shared similar sentiments. She argued that before Zimbabwe markets itself internationally, the government should prioritize domestic tourism and ensure citizens can access affordable and efficient transport. “It’s sad,” she said. “People laugh and cheer when they see a 1960s wagon being put back on the tracks. This was supposed to be normal. Instead, as you step off a train or plane to Mutare, you are greeted not by progress but by exhausted Zimbabweans struggling to make ends meet at every street corner.”

For Joseph Masocha, a farmer in Manicaland, the two-day extravaganza in Mutare was a missed opportunity. He described it as a political event staged to impress foreign delegates, many of whom have been attending Sanganai Expo for years, without addressing the realities facing ordinary citizens. “We need infrastructure and services that work every day, not once-a-year publicity stunts,” he lamented.

Analysts agree that tourism cannot thrive in isolation. A sustainable sector depends on solid infrastructure, reliable transport, and a strong domestic market that inspires confidence in visitors. Yet Zimbabwe’s approach continues to be piecemeal, focusing on grand launches and symbolic gestures rather than the systematic rebuilding of a collapsed transport system.

According to official records, tourism contributes significantly to the fiscus, but experts argue that the potential is much greater. Without affordable, accessible transport networks and a serious investment in domestic tourism, the sector risks becoming a showcase for political theater rather than a driver of economic growth.

The running of the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) remains the talk in bars, hotels and lodges, since the resignation of the previous CEO, Winnie Muchanyuka under unclear circumstances, on December of 2023, ZTA posted an open vacancy for the post in July 2025, raising more questions than answers on development and running of the Tourism industry in Zimbabwe in sync with the development agenda.