2007 started very promising for us in Zimbabwe. We had no plans of leaving Zimbabwe. MaNyoni decided to resign from her job as a bank teller. She had been working for years in the back office at CABS head office in Borrowdale Harare. After I became Bulawayo branch manager for Zimnat Lion Insurance Company from 1 April 2006, MaNyoni requested a transfer to Bulawayo and she became a bank teller. She now worked on weekends and stayed late to balance books like all bank tellers do. During public holidays she was required to come to work and load the ATM with cash. She was not happy as a bank teller.
Our personal businesses were doing well, we had scaled back on our general dealer shops from 10 the previous year and now only remained with 4 profitable shops in Macheke and Mutoko resettlement areas. That year we grew tobacco for the first time although it was on a small scale I got a very good grade of tobacco, I remember feeling very proud when I attended the tobacco auction floor in Willowvale Harare, people commended me for such a nice crop of tobacco. The previous year, I had started operating a Toyota minibus taxi(I will never run a taxi business again)from Macheke to my shop just after Virginia. My 7 tonne Bedford truck was carrying cotton around Mutoko. We were also renting a 6 acre plot in Kensington, Bulawayo where we did market gardening. I employed more than a dozen people. I had a very capable manager in Macheke🙏🏿
I had a stroke of luck one Sunday morning. On the previous Friday afternoon I had driven to Francistown Botswana to buy clothes and shoes stock from Chinese traders and on Saturday morning I had driven to Musina South Africa to buy groceries such as boxes of cooking oil, washing soap, petroleum jelly etc. I woke up around 3am at home to drive almost 600kms to my shops. I gave a lift to a number of people from Bulawayo. Before I dropped off this guy in Gweru he asked if I could get sugar beans in Mutoko as they were in demand in Bulawayo due to the drought that year from the traditional source in Masvingo irrigation schemes.
I got to Mutoko that morning and bought 4 x 50kg bags of sugar beans from farmers from my shop. The following day was a Monday, I phoned the guy and he did not have money, I started researching the market in Bulawayo. I eventually sold the sugar beans for a huge profit to this wholesaler owned by an Indian gentleman close to Rainbow hotel. I took a week leave from work and started buying sugar beans from farmers door to door in Mutoko close to Corner Store Mutoko. I went through hills and bad roads, my company allocated Toyota Hilux came in handy.
I hired a trailer and carried two tonnes per trip from Macheke to Bulawayo. After MaNyoni resigned we no longer had helpers at home. The two of us loaded and offloaded those 50kg bags alone💪🏿 I eventually negotiated a good price with this company that supplied OK and TM supermarkets. There were cash shortages at that time but the guy paid me in cash. I supplied about 5 tonnes. We made around R100 000.00, this other guy in the Insurance industry his father was selling an Isuzu bakkie for around R30 000.00, I paid cash and I didn’t even test drive it, I asked him to drop it at home. I started using it after I resigned and handed over the company car I had.
MaNyoni suggested that we save the money, I did not agree so I invested the rest in the shops. I would drive to Johannesburg Crown Mines to Africa Cash and Carry and bought radios, TVs, solar panels, batteries, groceries etc and filled up my shops. I bought more stock in Francistown. Cotton farmers were being paid cash right there at our shopping center at my main shop at Janhi in Mutoko and would come and buy. Zimbabwean dollar was fast losing value but we were tracking the black market rate. Every week I would convert the money to over R20 000.00. After Easter I decided to resign from my job inflation made my salary worthless. Being at work hindered me from making more money.
Then American Ambassador Christopher Dell was quoted saying, Mugabe risked being toppled due to the high inflation. Over night Mugabe launched the price control blitz. Scores of executives from manufacturing and retail companies were arrested. Government officials came to my shops and forced my workers to sell stock for a fraction of what we had imported it for. My manager was also arrested as she recounted to me, there was a police officer, army, intelligence operative etc, they accused her of trying to bring down the government due to high prices.
We lost a lot of money. Up to that point, I had never seriously considered leaving Zimbabwe, I had always believed through hard work we could live a decent life in Zimbabwe. Many villagers don’t have cash so I always bartered maize for groceries. After the price control blitz there was shortages of food in the country. I started carrying a tonne of maize every night from Virginia, Macheke I would avoid police roadblocks In Marondera ( I grew up in Marondera so I know all the back roads) I would sell the maize in Mayambara, Chitungwiza and got paid in Rands.
Villagers started buying goods with forex due to the shortages. My problem was that my passport was at the South African embassy for 6 weeks awaiting the outcome on the work permit application so I couldn’t travel to Botswana or South Africa to buy stock. In Zimbabwe almost every manufacturer had stopped production. We were now looking to rebuild our business with the expensive stock we were buying in Harare. I collected my work permit on 22 August 2007, that morning whilst driving to my shop in Macheke the Isuzu bakkie broke down by the farm belonging to former Finance Minister Simba Makoni. MaNyoni and I travelled overnight home to Bulawayo and we left for South Africa the next morning hoping to go and apply for jobs and come back to Zimbabwe to rebuild. On 31 August 2007, I signed an employment offer and started working on 1 September 2007.
I bought parts for the Isuzu and it was repaired and I learnt that in my absence my driver was now ferrying passengers to and from Mutoko and pocketing the money. The next time the bakkie broke down I didn’t send parts. At that time I was using taxis in South Africa whilst my driver was abusing my vehicle. Within a few months in South Africa I realised that my qualifications and experience didn’t count for much. Many companies didn’t employ foreigners, I saw no future in South Africa. I was planning to go back home for good as soon as I paid my Toyota Tazz of which I owed the bank less than R50 000,00.
I started restocking my shops from end of 2007. I loaded as much goods I could fit into the Tazz and drove to Zimbabwe. Around February 2008, I took leave and went to Zimbabwe. I travelled to Musina and bought cartons of cooking oil and carried using haulage trucks coming from South Africa. I went to Zimbabwe for the March 2008 elections which was won by MDC. We were planning to go back home for good until the election violence started 😢 inflation became even worse in 2008. I was traveling to Zimbabwe every month and the situation was very hopeless, it was even more difficult to run any business from South Africa, I had no option but to close.
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