Njelele Shrine, Matobo National Park

The Njelele Shrine is a cave which is of significant spiritual importance in Zimbabwe; pilgrims visit it annually for ritual purposes prior to the beginning of the rain season. The shrine is inside a cave that is located in the Matobo Hills in the Khumalo communal area approximately 100 kilometres south of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second largest city. The shrine is found in a solid granite kopje which is not different from a plethora of others that are in the vicinity. The outthrust of this shrine is situated on a mountain range that runs westwards. The shrine has "three naturally hidden entrances that wind up and down among overhang granite boulders." The cave is not the main feature of Njelele but the gallery in the rocks. It is also endowed with a number of small tunnels, which lead to the shrine's various chambers from the narrow entrance which is between two tall rocks. Njelele is mainly known as the rain-making shrine however, it is visited for other purposes such as asking for forgiveness after society's wrongdoings, asking for cures for human and domesticated animals diseases. An assortment of skulls and horns of big game, iron hoes, clay pots containing water, cloth and beads, piles of tobacco, hatchets, and spears are kept in one of the caves at Njelele. Some scholars believe that these were objects offered to the presiding deity. In the 1960s and 70s, this shrine was consulted by politicians and liberation fighters. One notable member who visited the Shrine was Joshua Mqabuko Nkomo the then leader of ZIPRA and former Zimbabwean Vice President. It is believed that some time ago, a voice came from the Njelele rocks instructing those who would have visited it on what to do; even Nkomo acknowledged this in his autobiography The Story of My Life. The voice was last heard in 1974; it disappeared due to the desecration of the shrine. ()