Unravelling at the borders
I have a contact who does a lot of cross border trading and with things the way they are now - not being able to buy anything in our local shops - I’m seeing him more frequently than I did before.
He said to me the strain and hardship and nightmare experience of cross border trading is beginning to show in many ways at the border posts. The overall atmosphere, he thinks, is that the civil service and armed forces have had enough.
Beitbridge is packed with cross border traders, but activity during daylight is slow even though there are crowds of people. All of them lurk at the customs buildings till nightfall. The reason for this is that once the sun sets, bribery and corruption are the order of the day with customs officials demanding payment for goods being brought into the country.
He also told me that the border jumpers (desperate Zimbabweans forced to leave Zimbabwe and enter South Africa illegally) now brazenly bribe the Zimbabwe border police who allow the illegal emigrants to cross the Limpopo over the bridge. They then then creep under the fence on the South African side.
