Police say crime rate is on the rise in Harare with Mbare recording a 3,8% increase over the past six months compared to the same period last year.
Elsewhere in the capital, 18 taxis were robbed last month alone, four of them on the same day. Police said this week they were getting increasingly worried and are calling on citizens to be vigilant. “We recorded high cases of taxi robberies between 8 and 23 May.
“The highest statistics were four taxis that were robbed in a single day, on May 21. What is happening is that the taxis are hired during late hours and when they get to the destination the driver is grabbed, tied and shoved to the back seat. Some are stripped naked and dumped in the bush,” said police spokesperson Inspector James Sabau.
“The taxis are usually hired by one person, who will then have some of his colleagues waiting at an agreed destination where they would attack,” said Sabau
Taxi drivers who spoke to NewsDay said they were now operating in perpetual fear.
“I was hired by two men in the evening at around 11pm who said they wanted to go to Msasa. On our way, one of them told me to stop saying they had reached their destination.
“One of them then suddenly choked me from behind and they started searching me.
“I was dumped in the bush from where I had to walk for about seven kilometres to the nearest police station. We found the car the following day, but it had been stripped,” said one taxi driver.
