ZRP not doing enough to protect the public

By The NewsDay | May. 28, 2016 | 5 Min read

I passed through Girls High School, at the scene where one of its students, 17-year-old Jocelyn Gomba was hit and killed by a kombi driver, and found kombis lined up at this illegal point.

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The demonstration by students from both Girls High School and Queen Elizabeth School yielded nothing as it was business as usual for these defiant kombi drivers who have reigned supreme on Harare’s road network.

There is so much chaos that has been created by these kombi drivers and we urge the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) to seriously clampdown on the “marauding lions” that have caused untold suffering for the general pedestrian public in Harare.

Gone are the days when it was safe to walk on any pavement in the central business district (CBD) because kombi drivers have become lawless and more daring each day.

This scenario has also been worsened by small private cars known as mushikashika that park at street corners as shuttles that disturb the smooth flow of traffic in and around the city centre.

I saw ZRP officers holding spikes yesterday at the corner of Fourth Street and Jason Moyo Avenue, one of the points where these Toyota Raum vehicles and other small cars park making it so difficult for the motoring public to manoeuvre their way into the city centre.

Whether or not the police will win the battle is a question I keep asking because I saw a couple of these cars having moved further down Jason Moyo Avenue towards Second Street as of yesterday afternoon.

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The scene is just chaotic and unbelievable because this is a situation that has been allowed to mushroom, just like the vendors who now occupy most of the CBD pavements.

It is no longer enjoyable driving across the city centre because these little cars and the kombi drivers have literally ignored measures by both Harare City Council and the ZRP to maintain law and order.

Jocelyn Gomba, the Girls High student, is the fourth person from that school to have met such a fate and I doubt if she will be the last because these drivers are cunning and have no respect for human life.

I applaud the students, who demonstrated against these kombi drives, but I also wished the million man-march had also addressed some of these issues on Africa Day because Harare city centre is just a mess.

The city, according to acting Harare mayor Chris Mbanga, requires at least $1 billion for it to reach world-class status, but I wonder how this will happen when they have failed to remove vendors and kombi drivers off these streets.

We have witnessed or heard about how pedestrians have been overrun by the kombis while fleeing either fleeing the ZRP, municipal or other law enforcement agents like Vehicle Inspection Department officers.

Efforts to rein in these kombi drivers, who are hardly 30 years old, who are in some instances not valid licence holders, has not borne fruit.

But we are constantly amazed by the number of roadblocks along most of these roads which are supposed to check on these documents yet road carnage continues to rise.

Human life is sacrosanct and we cannot continue to allow such lawlessness to continue unabated.

A comment by one of the daily newspapers noted that among many such accidents in which innocent pedestrians are killed by kombi crews are actually caused by conductors experimenting with passengers’ lives.

“What are clear are the current ZRP and Harare Municipal Police’s strategies of enforcing traffic rules and regulations having dismally failed and there is need for the two forces to go back to the drawing board and map out new strategies.

“All corners of our major roads in the city have become illegal pick-up points for kombis and when these people see police officers approaching, they take off at high speed.

“There are many cases where passengers have fallen off steps of such kombis and died,” the editorial noted.

I could not agree more. Stiffer penalties and deterrent prison terms must be imposed on such drivers and kombi owners who employ these young and inexperienced drivers to have their permits withdrawn.

The problem that our law enforcement agents have is that they are reactive and not proactive.

The world-class status which Mbanga is yearning for will not be achieved for as long as these menacing rogue drivers are not rid.

This state of affairs is not healthy, especially for tourists, who have also been victim to these menacing kombis and vendors. Some tourists have lost their hard-earned cash in the melee as the public flees these marauding lawless drivers.

The question is: What has happened to Zupco which was said have procured so many buses to serve the public transport sector?

This is what happens when a government reneges on its mandate to provide a safe public transport for its citizens that is also affordable.

Tynwald North residents near Westgate, for example, are charged $2 return fare by kombis yet those going further down to Dzivarasekwa Extension are charged $1 return fare.

If residents complain, they stop plying this route. The current public transport model is not affordable and safe for the general public and something has to be done about this as a matter of urgency.

How come government finds it so easy to demolish houses built on undesignated land and yet all stakeholders have failed to rid this traffic chaos?

I have on so many occasions been “bullied” off the road when driving in the CBD by these kombi drivers and this has resulted in my hate for doing any business in the capital city.

Driving through this area is nerve-wracking as kombis will not observe simple road traffic rules and will instead hurl insults at law-abiding citizens trying to knock sense into them.

Ignatius Chombo, the Minister of Home Affairs, should take drastic measures to curb and stop these errant kombi drivers just like how he has given the directive to stop spot fines by the police.

Or are they waiting for one of their children or relatives to die in this fashion before action is taken?

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