Messages and reports on social media can be very deceiving. Residents of Tshixwadza in Mutale learnt this first-hand when they noticed with shock that a photo taken during a community fun walk about three years ago was re-posted on Facebook and falsely connected to some very recent xenophobic acts in the area.
The photo being circulated now is captioned: "We hear that residents of Lwamondo are chasing Zimbabweans away from their village" (translated from Tshivenda).
An article about the fun walk, which took place at Tshixwadza on 30 December 2019, appeared in Limpopo Mirror's edition of 18 January 2020 ("Together We Can Grow Fun Run/ Walk"). The event organiser, Mr Dovhani Mudzielwana, said the event had been for a good cause aimed at encouraging unity among the communities, promoting healthy living through fitness and, more importantly, encouraging networking and progressive life. This, Mudzielwana said, was now being placed in a negative light by being connected to xenophobic acts.
"We saw that the picture is being falsely used on social media and associated with the occurrence at Lwamondo, where people were recently chasing foreigners away. As the Tshixwadza community and organisers of the fun walk, we promote social cohesion. We have never engaged in such an activity at Lwamondo. We distance ourselves from such behaviour and we ask that people stop circulating our picture for this negative exercise. We request that those who circulated the picture for their own selfish ends delete it from their pages immediately. We again warn that future usage of the picture is deemed illegal and necessary actions will be taken against such individuals," he said.