I know what the Highway Code says, but it is time somebody spoke up for the kombi driver. He was trying to oblige a passenger; not a pretty girl he wanted to impress, but someone nearer to his mother’s age. Traditional good manners dictate that he should respect her. It’s difficult for him to say “pardon me, ambuya. I’m not allowed to do that. I’ll drop you as soon as I can,” especially as nobody else, least of all the “guardians of the law”, respects laws much more important than that one.
We saw a similar stop near ZBC and when we arrived in town, the conductor helped a blind passenger across the road. These guys do all they can to please their passengers. Maybe we, as passengers, should not make unreasonable requests of them.
Far too many other people make unreasonable requests, demands and orders. Some people complain that kombis are overloaded and go too fast. That is because the owners press their drivers to carry the maximum number of passengers in the shortest time, to make more profits. The situation is not helped by cops who aren’t really interested in the good of the passengers, of other road users or even of the kombi crew; all they want is to line their own pockets.
What happened to the law we had in the 1980s regulating buses? It stated that, if a bus was overloaded, badly maintained, lacking spare wheel or necessary tools or if the driver was driving longer hours than allowed, the owner had to answer in court. He might also be held liable if he was forcing his drivers to keep a timetable that made them over-speed.
What happened to that law? The answer seems to be “cops and their friends became kombi owners, so they forgot it.”
Maybe we should revise our history texts like this: the First Chimurenga was the unsuccessful struggle against a small group who grabbed our mines, minerals and best land; the Second was when the people who refused to accept defeat fought back. The Third was when another small group grabbed all the best land, the mines and minerals and the Fourth is the resistance put up by those who don’t accept defeat.
That makes our much-maligned kombi crews, especially the independent operators, the non-violent soldiers of our new liberation war. They don’t use guns and landmines. They don’t indulge in sabotage like some of the unsung heroes of the Second Chimurenga that many of us knew. They do refuse to give in.
Other drivers meekly stop at roadblocks and pay any bribe that the guys in grey demand; kombi drivers do all they can to avoid that. See how quickly they spread the word about a new roadblock, and their extraordinary skill at dodging. Don’t call them reckless drivers; they are doing this for you, the passenger. Don’t call them bad drivers; if they weren’t very skilled, they’d all have been dead long ago. Even from a vulnerable front seat, I just enjoy their skill.
And remember: paying your kombi fare doesn’t guarantee you’ll travel the same route as yesterday. It doesn’t guarantee that you will be dropped at the advertised destination, though you won’t be too far away – 200m or so for a city centre terminus, on a bad day 400m if you are going to the University. That is the best they can do for their passengers while dodging the exactions of the cops and the gangs at the terminus. They deserve our support, not criticism.
Post published in: Opinions & Analysis