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Coming Home
On Friday I did a really stupid thing - I had driven down to Beitbridge
on
business and then, because I could not find fuel in any of the usual
places
I had to cross the border to South Africa to buy some diesel in
Mussina.
I went down to the border at 16.00 hrs. No sign of any problems on our
side - it all looked quite calm. Then, after I had cleared Immigration
and
Customs, I presented myself to the external customs officers for final
clearance and inspection of my vehicle. I had brought Z$2 million with
me
for the bridge toll and after paying this I had Z$1465 000 plus some
Rand. I
declared this and when I finally got to the officer dealing with
currency I
was told that he would have to confiscate Z$1 165 000 so as the leave
me
with Z$300 000 which was the maximum I was allowed to take out of the
country.
I explained to this gentleman that I was only going over to fill up and
would be back in an hour or so and that I needed Z$535 000 for the
bridge
toll. No he said to me, the regulations only allow you to take out
Z$300
000. "How do I pay the bridge toll then?" He said that was none of his
business. "How do I get back into Zimbabwe if I cannot pay the toll?" I
asked - he shrugged his shoulders.
So back into the border post - I persuaded the bridge toll supervisor
to
sell me my re-entry ticket then and was left with Z$930 000. As I
arrived
back in the Zimra inspection area I saw a local farming friend and
asked him
to take Z$630 000 so that I was left with the requisite Z$300 000, he
agreed
and I collected the money from him later. Then back to the Customs man
who
reluctantly let me go. It is now after 17.00 hrs and I head for the
South
African side.
On arrival we were told they had closed the normal exit route for
visitors -
"please go to that door". Behind the door was a long queue to a desk
where a
lone immigration officer sat. It was hot and airless in the passage
where we
queued and after an hour and a half I was some three people from the
desk
when a officer arrived to say this desk is closing - please go back to
the
normal route. A rush ensued - those at the front of the queue found
themselves at the back of the new queue! Another huge shambles - they
pushed
everyone out of the border post and then organized the queue to match
the
order in which we had been in the other queue.
By now we have been there nearly two hours and were then handled quite
quickly and found ourselves in the dark outside the border post in
South
Africa. As I left the area a new horror confronted me - there as far as
you
could see was a sea of motor vehicles trying to get into the border
post
from the other side. They were not the normal sort of vehicle you might
expect at a border post - the majority were small pick-ups loaded with
trailers piled high with every sort of item. Toilet bowls, sinks,
baths,
bicycles empty drums, full drums, food and bags of every kind you can
imagine. The rest of the space was taken up with people - thousands of
ordinary people, all trying to get home for Christmas.
If ever you needed confirmation of the fact that 2 to 3 million
Zimbabweans
now live in South Africa, you could do no better than simply visit that
queue on the SA side of the border. It had started, I was told, on
Thursday
night - by Friday morning it was 5 kilometres long, by Friday lunchtime
it
was 7 kilometres long and eventually it nearly reached Mussina - 12
kilometres from the actual border with 4 500 vehicles in a huge log jam
of
pushing, shoving humanity and smoking engines.
I got to the local filling station only to find that it was sold out of
petrol but had diesel. I filled up, bought a burger and headed back
into the
scrum, bracing myself for a long night. After a long wait during which
I was
unable to even get into the queue, a police offer spoke to me - I
explained
my dilemma and he allowed me into the queue - about 300 meters to go. I
worked out they were clearing 2 cars a minute on average - but at that
rate
the vehicles in the queue behind me had a long 30 hour wait.
It took me an hour to reach the front, then 30 minutes to find parking
and
then I had to face a queue that was about 150 meters long and five
people
wide. I again explained my dilemma to a customs officer and this time
he
arranged for me to go into the exit and there I was dealt with in five
minutes and was then back in the queue for the bridge. At 10.30 I
crawled
into Zimbabwe exhausted and thirsty - even at that time of night it was
hot.
The following day I met one of the valiant vehicles that had just come
through the border - I asked him how long - he replied "two days." I
thought
he had done rather well. As we drove out of Beitbridge on Sunday
morning we
were met with a Zimra roadblock managed by armed Police. Here the poor
guys
who had spent two days and nights in the queues and at the border post
-
without toilets or water or food, were again subjected to a detailed
search
to make sure they had declared every item and all duty had been paid. I
explained that we were "local" and was waved through. How those other
poor
guys felt about their "homecoming" was anyone's guess.
As for the bridge toll - that is charged by a company owned and
operated by
a group linked to Zanu PF and they are allowed to charge the toll in
foreign
currency with locals being required to pay in Zimbabwe dollars at the
interbank rate. This means it is now changing every week as the dollar
devalues and on Saturday night it was raised again. As it is now twice
the
value of the sum you are allowed to take out, I suggest that the
Minister
of Finance fix the toll at the level of what we are allowed to take out
-
that would satisfy me and limit the fantastic profits this bunch of
thieves
is taking at the same time.
Eddie Cross
Bulawayo, 20th December 2005
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