CLAIM: Goora Business Centre,Mt. Darwin- Bindura Road. 7 pedestrians mowed down
SOURCE: Twitter
VERDICT: False
Reports that two cars racing on a public road struck 7 people shared on Twitter here and here and on Facebook here, are false. The same was also shared on WhatsApp.
The Facebook post read, “Multiple people dead after car racing accident in Harare. Videos circulating on social show bodies some missing limbs strewn on the ground. One of the cars hit a tree.
This publication will not be publishing the pictures.
UPDATE CORRECTION : The accident happened at Goora Business Center on the Bindura- Mt Darwin Highway. 7 people are believed to have date (sic).”
One of the Twitter posts read, “Goora Business Centre,Mt. Darwin- Bindura Road. 7 pedestrians mowed down”
The reports are a mixture of truth and lies. Videos being shared are of two different incidents – the first is of two cars racing happened in Zimbabwe – though it’s not clear when.
The second video shows bodies lying on the ground (disturbing content: viewer discretion needed) and those posting it claim that it was an accident scene resulting from the two racing cars seen in the earlier video.
It is claimed that the racing cars killed 7 pedestrians. The reports further claim that this was in Goora, Mount Darwin.
Verification
The first thing that FactCheckZW did was to check media reports for an accident in Goora killing 7 people.
There were hits on Google search and all of them from a March 2021 incident.
And this is a picture from the accident scene:
FactCheckZW also searched Google Earth to look at the terrain around Goora, Mt Darwin.
This was nothing like the scene of the accident on the video alleging a recent accident in Goora.
Where did the accident happen?
To check if the video of the accident could be recent and where it could have happened, FactCheckZW went back to the video.
In the video a BMW is involved and there are at least 3 people lying on the ground. Since the reports mentioned 7 people, a Google Search was done for an accident involving a BMW in which at least 7 people were injured.
The first result showed an article from a South African newspaper IOL with a story on a BMW accident in which nine pedestrians were struck.
The article has a picture on it:
We compared certain elements of the picture with those in the video.
There is a cooler box in the video besides an injured woman similar to the one in the picture above.
Another picture of the accident scene shows an overturned black chair:
Which can also be seen on the video:
The pictures show that the car is partially under a tree and is facing a palisade fence:
And this tree and fence can be seen on the video.
A satellite image of the area where the accident happened – 6th Street and Koch Street, Salvokop, Pretoria – was also looked at.
There were other articles on the accident here and here.
From this, it became clear that the two videos being linked together on social media are unrelated. One is of two cars racing in Zimbabwe and the other of an accident scene in Salvokop in which a BMW driver killed 3 children and injured 4 other people.
The Goora accident being linked to the video, is not recent, but happened more than a year ago.
And Shona being used?
There are two possibilities as to why Shona is being used in the video. One is that a voice over from another incident could have been superimposed on the accident video or that some of the people involved there might be Shona speaking.
The driver has been identified as Clayton Chikandiwa and the father of the deceased twins as Alfred Taruvinga.
FactCheckZW will update the article if it verifies this.
Conclusion
The claim that 7 people were killed in an accident involving a BMW racing in Zimbabwe in January 2023 is false. The videos in circulation are unrelated. The cars racing in the Tik Tok video were in Zimbabwe and are not linked to the second video of the accident scene. The accident scene video is not of the Goora accident. The Goora accident happened in March 2021. The video being circulated is from Pretoria of an accident involving a BMW driver who killed 3 children and injured 4 people.
