Apart from one blitz in Glen Norah on cars with old number plates, the police seem to be focusing all their attention on driving kombis off the roads and driving the passengers to distraction.
Some passengers remark that there are kombis that get less harassment than others. It used to be clear who the owners were. We haven't recently noticed so many advertising their business address as Braeside police camp, Machipisa police camp or Mbare police camp, but it's easy enough to find yourself another address. Observers don't suppose police have all dis-invested from this lucrative business – but it is only lucrative if you aren't going to be 'fined' your day's earnings too often.
Boss K rumours
There are now very few kombis plying the Mbare-city route that don't belong to Boss K, owner of kombis with registration KUREVA 1 to KUREVA 6, a couple advertising that he is 'Mr.Mbare' and plenty more – rumour says he owns 36. As his presence on the roads increased visibly in the past fortnight, the presence of police roadblocks on his route declined. Can this be coincidence? His drivers always seemed to get less harassment than their rivals.
There are passengers who say they prefer to travel in Boss K's kombis.
If they get a better service in a situation of free competition, then good for Boss K, and he deserves to succeed. But private monopolies are always dangerous and private monopolies of public services more so. “Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely,” as Lord Acton said. That is true even if the power is gained by fair means.
Older readers will remember when we entrusted our political future to a Reverend who went on to prove that even Reverends are human and corruptible. Total control of public transport in Mbare, with police supporting the monopolist by harassing his competitors, is the kind of power no human individual should be trusted with. Many politicians, and not only those from the outgoing regime, would give a right arm for that sort of power, but that is all the more reason for taking precautions against it happening.
Less flamboyant, more dangerous
Boss K may be a public benefactor, but can he be relied on to remain so public-spirited if there are no checks on his power? And he is not the only one. Such transport monopolies exist in other towns and in other parts of Harare the struggle is ongoing. The local bosses in those places might be greedier and more oppressive than Boss K. If they are less flamboyant, they are probably more dangerous.
And if these emerging local bosses were to form an alliance, purely for business reasons of course, would anybody be surprised if most of them proved to have profited greatly from the former dictatorship? They would naturally no longer have their ZANU cards or their military uniforms and their CVs would have been carefully edited and cleaned up, but a leopard doesn't change his spots that easily.
Post published in: News