City’s pirate cab, kombi menace

Moffat Mungazi Post Correspondent

TAKING off at a devilishly high speed, a pirate kombi fleeing from police officers brandishing spikes encroaches into the opposite lane and drives against the flow of traffic.

Worming its way through a meandering course of blaring vehicle horns, the driver almost loses control of the van as it swerves onto a kerb and — missing only by the tiniest of inches — nearly hits a pedestrian strapping a baby on her back. Scurrying to safety, the woman counts herself lucky and in her frenzied shock and anger spews some expletives as she agitatedly waves her supposed assailants away.

Equally baffled, the cops relent in their hot pursuit of the pirate kombi in the interest of public safety.

Without driving further down the road, the kombi makes a sharp and abrupt U-turn without signal. It leaves a near-pile up in its confused wake and a potentially fatal carnage is avoided.

Reads like a fictional action-packed movie script, right? Perhaps yes, but this is a familiar and daily occurrence law enforcement agents in Mutare have to grapple with — the pirate kombi menace.

Transporters outside the Zupco franchise remain banned from ferrying passengers but they continue doing so.

Local Government and Public Works Minister July Moyo recently reiterated the position.

“Zupco-affiliated commuter omnibuses are the only ones allowed to operate, that is the policy in place and it has not changed. Anybody who has their own buses and want to operate must go and register with Zupco,” he said.

Prohibiting commuter omnibuses from operating is meant to bring sanity and safety on the roads, the minister added.

But despite the ban, pirate kombis and taxis have continued playing hide and seek with the police. These illegal activities or devious operations by unregistered private transport operators are collectively referred to as “mushika-shika” colloquially.

Their routines are run by cartel-like troops popularly referred to as “mahwindi” or rank marshals. At those spots, chaos is the order of the day. The operators ply both the short and long distance routes.

Going against the grain

Most public transport operators have been accused of being coarse when dealing with commuters, making good customer care virtually non-existent in their etiquette.

Their public relations often leave a lot to be desired, throwing them on collision course with commuters. Kombi drivers, perhaps as creatures of habit, are found offside most of the times by flouting regulations which govern the safe use of roads by pedestrians and other motorists.

Besides picking up or dropping off passengers at undesignated points, they speed recklessly or disrupt the smooth flow of traffic by dangerous driving or parking.

The crude conductors, presumably intoxicated to induce Dutch courage in the line of duty, make foul-mouthed utterances their routine choruses. Inevitably, customers feel short-changed by this uncouth behaviour.

Owing to these rogue operators’ mean-spirited demeanour, commuters have also bitterly complained about being charged unsustainably inflated fares, failure of which they do not complete the route.

Overloading, which goes against the dictates of traffic safety, also defines their unrefined deeds. Clearly, this compromises public safety.

Touts also jeopardise their own lives by precariously hanging on the half-closed doors of vehicles in motion.

As push comes to shove, the hwindis resort to touting as they tussle for passengers. In the ensuing din and mêlée, some passengers lose their valuables to theft or their luggage gets damaged.

Touting also obstructs pedestrian traffic, especially at Zesa Megawatt Building, Victoria Chitepo Provincial Hospital Bus Terminus, Sakubva Swimming Pool and Sakubva Musika in Mutare.

While commissioning 50 Zupco buses in Harare early this year, President Mnangagwa decried the abuse commuters suffer at the hands of unregistered operators.

“Our commuting public have often been subjected to poor services, unsafe travel and unsustainable fare structures. Going forward, I urge players in the public transport sector to give due regard to safety, orderliness and good customer care within the sector, towards quality service delivery.

“In this regard, the Zimbabwe Republic Police must continue to enforce Statutory Instrument 83 of 2020 with regards to urban transport service provision,” he said.

Clause Two of Statutory Instrument 83 of 2020 stipulates that “Transport services, whether intra-city or inter-city, for the carriage of passengers, shall be restricted to those provided by (a) the parastatal company known as the Zimbabwe United Passenger Company (Zupco); (b) omnibuses and other passenger service vehicles operated by or on behalf of the Public Service Association, the Police Service, the Defence Forces and the Civil Protection Authorities.”

Transport hot potato

Pirate kombi and taxi operators are creating a mini jungle at several termini and on the road, applying even the unwritten law of the jungle — survival of the fittest.

But just how do pirate kombis manage to be so sneaky? Some of these renegades even have the temerity of creating unconventional routes as a way circumventing confrontation with the police as well as evade arrest.

Yet others are alleged to be paying their way through security checkpoints, sometimes without complying with Covid-19 restrictions such as national lockdown curfew times. During their underhand operations, they hardly uphold recommended health protocols like masking up, hand sanitisation and physical distancing in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

Their chicanery is also ever-evolving as they devise new means of getting by.

To throw the pursuing cops off their trail and avoid being tracked through positive identification of the vehicles, some rogue operators are removing registration plates. This has the ripple effect of leaving unsuspecting commuters at the mercy of robbers who masquerade as transporters.

A kombi driver who declined to be named told The Manica Post that pirating is a means of survival for him.

“Look, a man has got to do what a man has got to do. We have families to feed and children to send to school. Rentals are also due every month that we are left with no choice but to engage in this enterprise in order to make ends meet. It has been hard surviving during these Covid-19 times.

“We are aware of the trouble we risk getting into with the law, but what else can we turn to? Besides, we are also struggling to meet the targets for the day’s proceeds set by our employers,” he said.

The driver also explained that they were merely exploiting loopholes in the Zupco system through covering the gaps created by the public transporter’s sometimes irregular schedule.

“Sometimes the Zupco buses are unable to service the routes due to unavailability of fuel and other logistical challenges and this is where we step in to provide an alternative. Other customers prefer us because we are a viable “go-faster” option.

“Also, at times Zupcos knock off early and when that happens we step in to save the situation for the stranded commuters. We can operate late into the night until it is almost curfew time.

“Remember at the height of a tight national lockdown, not everyone was able to get exemption letters, yet a genuine need to travel would have arisen and, again, we were the go-to guys,” he said.

However, he had no convincing answer for the pirate kombis’ recklessness on the roads.

Running battles

In a bid to enforce the ban on kombis and taxis, cops carry out crack operations aimed at rounding up the culprits. These have been sporadic, however, and the pirating continues to fester. In the ensuing cat-and-mouse game, the offenders have become even more cunning.

Pirate transport operators have set up base at the city’s main terminus for conventional Zupco buses popularly known as “PaMudzviti, behind Murahwa Building which ironically houses the Provincial Police Headquarters. This is as if they are taking the game to the law-enforcement agents.

Other hunting grounds are dotted in the high-density suburbs of Sakubva, Dangamvura and Chikanga as well as downtown.

Kombis have earned the notoriety of being involved in running battles with the police at those hotspots.

To avoid running into trouble with cops, passengers are sometimes dropped off before they reach their destinations or on the peripheries of the city on occasions crack operations will be ongoing.

Manicaland provincial police spokesperson Inspector Luxson Chananda said the police have long declared war on pirate kombis.

“We would like to warn those operating pirate kombis and taxis against this illegal practice because they are prohibited from doing so. They must adhere to the stipulated provision and get registered under Zupco. We will not hesitate to arrest those caught on the wrong side of the law by enforcing this ban. Repeated offenders will be prosecuted in the courts of law and have their vehicles impounded.

“In fact, we are routinely carrying out exercises to curb this rampant problem. The ongoing operations will get intensified if need be.

However, we are also encouraging the commuting public to desist from riding on pirate kombis and taxis as they risk handing themselves over to robbers disguised as transporters,” said Inspector Chananda.