Abstract
This article explores the issue of urban management in the face of ‘informal’ or illegal commercial practices in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe. It captures the deep-rooted presence of touts who have, for years now, been controlling public spaces of terminals in Harare’s Central Business District. The article is based on narratives from newspapers, radio and comments by stakeholders and aided by theoretical explanations derived from literature review. The western theory of travelling does not differ much from that of Africa only in so much increasing ‘informality’ has distorted it greatly. It has been noted that the major problem is an institutional one yet, the mismanagement of space has overarching challenges for different stakeholders of the city, including passengers and commuter omnibus operators. The article concludes by saying that without the necessary back-up systems, it is a waste of time and resources to embark on aggressive clean-up campaigns of the city. In this case, Harare has no option but to fully ‘capitalise’ its management and develop control mechanisms if the unruliness and distortions posed by touts is to be curbed substantially.
Introduction
Setting the Background
In early September 2012, a militarised campaign against touts in Harare was launched (Gonda, 2012). This was done in the name of restoring sanity to the city’s terminals so that the municipality would take full charge of them. It was believed that these touts operated as agents of the ‘political bigwigs’ to whom they sent their cash collections at the end of the day. For three weeks, the police and the army were ruthlessly ‘dealing with the touts’. I happened to board kombi (commuter omnibus) to my home. It was around six in the evening and on a recently launched radio station, Star FM, an interview was being aired and the guest was the Mayor of Harare, Muchadeyi Masunda. He was being questioned on the recent campaign to ‘clean the city’. He said that the city was planning to hold a meeting with all stakeholders to discuss issues related to this campaign. The programme coordinator jokingly said, ‘I hope the [ousted] touts are also going to be given space to air their views too!’ I could not quite hear the Mayor’s response, however I took the opportunity to ask the driver and conductor of the kombi some related questions. I remarked, ‘So this programme is about you?’
On the following day, 20 September 2012, as I started to teach my first lecture to the final year students, I explained the problem of informal and ‘unruly’ cities. The course is Urban Development and Management. I used the above example to show the level of unruliness. ‘Suppose we have 30 spots dotted around the Central Business District (CBD) in which kombi operators have to contribute $600 to pay off the touts. How much will the spots contribute per day?’ Calculations indicated that per day, touts around the entire CBD space would have collected $18,000. In 30 days, they would have collected $540,000. In a year, they would have collected more than $162,000,000—one hundred and sixty two million dollars, more than a tenth of a billion getting into the wrong pocket. Some students fumed. They measured this ‘municipal loss’ against the poverty of service delivery they were witnessing in the city—uncollected garbage, potholed roads, poorly functioning street lights and a general squalor at the terminals themselves. All these issues were an indicator of a ‘bleeding city’, haemorrhaging from neglect and governance apathy. As long as the control of urban spaces was not watertight as was the case, the city’s service delivery system would remain unsatisfactory.
By the following Sunday there were reports in the media that touts were likely to come back: It was said that municipal authorities had failed to take over the terminals citing limitations of resources. Without theologising on the matter too much, one is constrained to recall the Scriptures and remember what happens after one is exorcised and there is no immediate replacement of the vacuum by the Holy Spirit. It is said, that the evil spirits would be checked only if the ‘cleansed house’ had a new occupier. In their absence, they would find one stronger than them whom they would invite to re-invade the space. Once that happened, the fate of the host was said to be far worse than before. When institutions are weak, if whatever decision is taken by the authorities is not complemented by appropriate back-up action then stabilisation will not follow.
Theoretical Overview
The reality is urban spaces are highly contested (Kamete, 2011; Magwaro-Ndiweni, 2011) because of their location, strategic functions and accessibility. Harare is the capital city of Zimbabwe. Like most developing countries, Zimbabwe is suffering from urban primacy and its dis-economies and negative externalities disequilibrium characterising the settlement system in the country, a condition equally blamed on past colonial regimes that deliberately set to promote separate development through ‘apartheid ideologies’ (Chirisa, 2013). For Harare, the city centre is a hub of major activities which, in essence, attracts different players for control and use of its land. The decline of its more formal, that is legitimate activities, beginning in the mid-1990s, saw the pull of informal players which are threatening the once glorified structure and outlook of the city (ibid).
When it achieved independence, Zimbabwe opened its doors to all, but during colonial rule the bulk of the black population was ‘incarcerated’ in the rural and specifically tribal trust lands. Those who came to the city had to provide evidence that they were gainfully employed in the urban areas. In the town, then, strict zones were created so that the black Africans stayed in African townships, far away from the whites adding to the plight and detriment of the city’s space and economy. The contemporary urban re-configuration of the urban territory in Zimbabwe is a direct response to the need to deal with the colonial legacy of institutionalised racism and zoning on racial grounds.
Today, Harare is ‘littered’ with all sorts of urban maladies, the worst being unemployment and a shrinking urban economy due to ‘bad policy prescriptions’ adopted as far back as the 1990s in the form of the structural adjustment programmes. Additionally, the controversial fast-track-land-reform programme in 2000 sent wrong signals to the functioning of not only the rural but the urban areas as well (Tevera & Chikanda, 2000). As whites ‘fled’ from ‘hot’ Zimbabwe, a wave of disinvestment also set in. In 2006, economic depression spread and heightened political temperatures triggered a wave of desperation and violence among the populace. Like most urban centres in the country, Harare experienced a significant decline that began perhaps the day Zimbabwe was loosened from the shackles of colonialism. The decline witnessed a massive informality take centrestage, defining the process of urban change not only in Harare but also other towns of Zimbawe.
In 2005, Zimbabwe embarked on Operation Restore Order (also referred to as Operation Murambatsvina), to ‘clean’ cities by way of a forceful governmental campaign to clear slum areas. Nevertheless, urban informality continued to haunt the urban centres (Kamete, 2011). The hardest hit place of ‘informal activities’ concentration was Harare given its state and extent of primacy (ibid).
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary (online) defines a tout as ‘one who solicits patronage’. As a verb, touting is defined by the same source as an ‘attempt to sell (something), typically by pestering people in an aggressive or bold manner’. This term, coined for use in the informal transport business system in Zimbabwe, refers to those young men who assist commuter omnibus drivers with loading and unloading passengers. In most cases, they have to do this aggressively so that they do not lose any customers to rival buses who are also competing for clients. A section of these young people located at terminals manage, control and forcibly help passengers get into the right omnibuses to reach their destinations. The phenomenon of touts arose in the 1990s when transport in Zimbabwe was deregulated and new, but informal players, appeared (Maunder, Mbara & Khezwana, 1994; Mbara, 2002).
Touting is not peculiar only to South Africa only but also to east and Central Africa (UITP, 2008). In Zimbabwe, the commuter omnibuses (as opposed to the conventional buses) are referred to as kombis. In Kenya, they are referred to as matatu (Maunder et al., 1994; Mbara, 2002). In South Africa, they are simply referred to as taxis. Unlike South Africa, in Zimbabwe, a seat meant for just three is loaded with four passengers. The driver is assisted by a conductor who touts the entire trip to a given destination as the kombi picks and drops passengers. In South Africa, it is only the driver and one of the passengers seated in the front who collects fares from the rest of the passengers (cf. UITP, 2008). Touts operate in situ—at ‘ranks’ (i.e., at the terminals) as they are commonly referred to or in transit, when they assist the picking and dropping of passengers on a journey.
Evidence of a Declining City
The condition of Harare’s primacy has had major challenges: that of attracting urban diseconomies, including poverty concentration and related exigencies, in the form of informality that sentences the majority of urban inhabitants to the curse of ‘urban penalty’ (Kamete, 2011). With the declining economy, many households have found the informal sector as an outlet from the clutches of poverty that preoccupy them daily. Individuals and households are increasingly selling wares in the city’s streets, engaging informal transporters and sometimes taking over public spaces for commercial gain. Daily in the city, the streets see these households and individuals battling with the police who are trying to keep the city clean. Typically, the police confiscates their wares, manhandles the culprits who are then forced to pay ‘heavy penalties’ but on the following day they are back on the streets resisting the ‘law and order’ that the police symbolise.
Of the main public spaces that have fallen into the ‘wrong hands’ are the city-centre bus terminals, some already existing and some that have recently started. Harare city has five formally designated bus-terminals—Copacabana, Rezende, Market Square, Forth Street and Charge Office. A new band of ‘informal managers’ of such spaces has also emerged over the years. Like the ‘informal managers’ of parking spaces in the CBD, commuter omnibus operators (normally represented by their hired drivers and conductors) must pay for the ‘control’ of the terminals after loading. The recipients of money so collected are the ‘informal’ terminal managers, popularly known as ‘rank marshals’. Rank marshals are touts and have amassed great power over the years. They have become an institution in all ranks, setting the rules of the game. They decide who is to be allowed or disallowed in the terminals. They can reward or penalise those who cross their path. Commuter omnibuses have learnt to accommodate them. They have learnt to ‘dance to the music’ of the touts. Apart from the dollar people have to pay for exiting the terminal upon loading, the Council formally charges them $100 per three months for a licence disk to use the terminal. The $100 is part of the user charges. But what name should be given for the $1 paid for exiting to the touts?
Today, illegal ranks manned by touts are rampant in most urban centres in Zimbabwe. From being conformist, they have become social innovators and introduced several illegal pick-up points popularly known as mushika-shika (Herald, 2016, November). These illegal ranks are actually convenient to passengers but at the same time they are also dangerous. Dangerous because when the municipal and state police attack those operating illegal ranks, it always results in accidents. Inevitably, the blame is always placed on the law enforcement agencies; indicating that the community has actually accepted these news norm and do not understand why the government has not yet accepted them too. There has been a raging war against illegal ranks since 2012 but instead of reducing they are increasing (ibid). An analysis stated that these illegal ranks were thriving on readily available patronage: commuters want mushika-shika because they are more cheap. For example, the normal fare from the CBD of Harare to Mabvuku-Tafara costs $1 but from a mushika-shika one can travel the same distance for 50 cents (Daily News, 2016, 16 January). This puts a question mark on the location of various ranks in the CBD as touts, together with transport operators, have designated their ranks which seem to be flourish. All these points to a state of general anarchy and disorder in Harare city which often used to be described as a sunshine city before and soon after independence.
Seeking Meaning of Development: Interrogating Theory
The scenario describing Harare typifies most of Africa’s cities, most of which are in a deplorable state facing challenges of ‘urbanisation without economic growth which comes with immense levels of unemployment, poverty and elite capture of resources that must cascade down to every member of the city’ (Simone, 2003). In the following paragraphs some possible theories have been outlined explaining the realities of urban Zimbabwe today. The theories provided include Theory of Leakages and Corruption, Theory of Free-riding and Poverty, Theory of Anarchy, Theory of Cleaning-Up the City and Urban Gentrification, Theory of Right to the City and City of Rebels. It is important to note that these theories are interrelated and linked.
Theory of Right to the City and City of Rebels
The city is a ‘functionary’ of capitalistic diktats; cities are known as motor-generators of national wealth. The implications of urban development for overall economic prosperity are well known [with] employment, housing, policing, infrastructure and social policies in cities hav[ing] been shaped and institutionalised through a complex set of interactions between various urban interests, public officials, and institutions (Harvey, 2012). Planning comes in as an instrument by the state to protect interests of the few by stressing spatial order and dictating where to put development, spelling out the reasons thereof. The planning of Harare has its historical roots in British physical planning theory and practice. Like most colonial cities, Harare was created to be a city of a few (Zinyama, Tevera & Cumming, 1993). Independence in 1980 ushered in a new wave that allowed blacks to get into towns hence fulfilling the philosophy of the right to the city as put forward by Lefebvre (Harvey, 2012). It must be noted that the first decade of independence was marked by little ‘challenging’ by immigrants, from rural areas to the status quo. The state was socialistic in this first decade and was ‘people-centred’. As the immigrants trickled in the political terrain changed. By 1990, the state began to see the reason to shift to capitalism. It favoured the adoption of the Economic Structural Adjustment Programme (ESAP) in 1991. Many households plunged in poverty as a great number of breadwinners lost their jobs. Consequently, they ‘jumped onto the train’ of ‘informal’ employment. By the late 1990s, there was clear evidence of this growing ‘informal employment’ especially in the form of street vending. Such informality was no doubt some kind of rebellion, albeit a silent one, challenging the asymmetry of power and control in the formal urban structure and production systems. Baumol (1982, p. 1) has argued that:
[n]o uprising by a tiny band of rebels can hope to change an established order, and when the time for rebellion is ripe it seems to break out simultaneously and independently in a variety of disconnected centres each offering its own programme for the future.
The situation portrayed here reflects the general attitude of people acting as ‘rebels’. They may have been driven by a common cause but they were not in any way held together when it was time for action and implementing the idea to fight. Faced with a crisis, people applied various forms of coping strategies as a way to adapt to the environment. Using urban poverty as a crisis situation, Fawole, Ogunkan and Omoruan (2010) have observed that conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism and rebellion became the strategies. The following explanations have emerged from the analysis of the behaviour patterns as put across by Fawole et al. (2010, p. 12):
[The], ‘conformist’ accepts both the overall society goals and the approved means. The ‘innovator’ accepts the goal of the society but rejects the approved means of achieving it. The ‘ritualist’ abandons the goal but becomes compulsively committed to the institutional means. The ‘retreatist’ basically withdraws from the goal and the means the society. The final adaptor, the ‘rebel’ feels alienated from dominant means and goals, therefore seeks to create a new social structure. Having withdrawn from the goals and the means of society, beggars are typically portrayed as ‘retreatists’.
Unlike Nigeria (Fawole et al., 2010) where begging is rampant, in Harare, in particular, and Zimbabwe, in general, beggars in street corridors are hard to come by. Rather the urban poor tend to be innovators rather than ‘retreatists’ (cf. Kamete, 2011). They would rather sell and get involved in an enterprise rather than extend their hands in order to receive some monies from a well-wisher. If they are not selling then they would rather resort to becoming thieves, commercial sex workers and or indulge in other so-called ‘dirty works’.
Indeed, this characteristic reveals a great mark of rebellion in keeping with ubuntu values. Ubuntu is an African philosophy of humanness; it provides Africans a sense of self-identity, self-respect and achievement, enabling them to deal with their problems in a positive manner by drawing on the humanistic values they have inherited and perpetuated throughout their history (Nussbaum, 2003). The philosophy defines the African being. This is the art of being a human being (ibid). The person, muntu, is expected to show ubuntu by showing kindness, generosity, ability to live in harmony with others, friendliness, modesty, helpfulness, humility and happiness as means to co-exist with other human beings. This is premised on the strong belief that a human being is human only because of other human beings around him or her. Mutual respect and respect of others’ life and property then are cornerstones of survival. Empathy compassion and tolerance, just to mention a few, are primary values of an African being. Ubuntu is informed by an inherent code of ethics which, however, is expected to be written in the heart of man (Fawole et al., 2010). However, ubuntu is more of an ideal than anything else as violence, debauchery, larceny and a host of other misdemeanours are as rampant in Africa as elsewhere in the world (ibid). Thus, ubuntu becomes a benchmark for conflict resolution and peace-building.
Though it defies urban byelaws and code, at least street vending is viewed by many people as clean. As urban dwellers in Harare have faced a number of structural challenges they have also used strategies in the form of free-riding which, in essence, is a passive way of resistance as well as adaptation. Though touting is illegal, it is also surprising to see how they have been left to flourish in the face of clear evidence of sexual harassment of innocent women, foul mouthed and violent in some instances. Despite the police clampdown on touts, poverty is making these people resist (Herald, 2016, 16 November). Among the public transport operators, empathy compassion and tolerance have crept in signified by their compliance to the touts. The touts are mostly used in the illegal ranks where their services are most beneficial where they have to solicit patronage from passers-by. In the words of one operator:
… we have to give other people a job so that they can feed their families, we are all people who need to survive. These days if you don’t get a tout you won’t make it because they may sabotage your kombi persuading to others who would have paid.
The first part of the sentiment indicates that its sympathy that makes the operators embrace the touts, ubuntu, they share the view that after all we are human beings who need to survive. Also, the rebellious attitude borne by poverty has also made these people use all means necessary to remain in office for example sabotaging kombis that are not cooperating. The operators knowing that they are illegal, can still go on to illegally sabotaging legally sanctioned operators from doing business. This is a sign of rebellion. The Herald (2016, 16 January) had a report with a resident uttering that:
[t]hese clashes are not going to help anyone. The Council risk people’s lives by chasing after kombis, touts and using spikes … this will not change the problem…it is evident that kombis have no respect for traffic laws but the solutions cannot be the chases because this would endanger the lives of ordinary passengers.
These sentiments indicate that there is complete rebellion by the illegal transport operators and their patron soliciting agents/ touts. The touts are watchdogs and sometimes the kombis will be in the hands of those touts (often unlicensed) on mushika-shika. The running battles have not ceased which shows some kind of resistance.
Theory of Free-riding and Poverty
As a passive way of resisting the state or utilising market inaction to their plight, the poor often embark on a strategy of free-riding on services and goods available. Before Operation Murambatsvina, many households in high-density areas embarked on extending their houses and constructing backyard shacks with the idea of raising extra income. This was in direct contravention of the regulations laid down by standards and city bye-laws that such construction exceeded infrastructure requirements and capacity (cf. Tevera & Chikanda, 2000). An excerpt from the speech by the former Chairperson of the Harare Commission, Sekesai Makwavarara in The Herald (2005, 28 May) helps us understand the extent to which the bureaucracy could see this informality riding on its back:
The City of Harare wishes to advise the public that in its efforts to improve service delivery within the City, it will embark on Operation Murambatsvina, in conjunction with the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP). This is a programme to enforce by-laws to stop all forms of illegal activities… . These violations of the bye-laws are in areas of vending, traffic control, illegal structures, touting/abuse of commuters by rank marshals, street-life/prostitution, vandalism of property infrastructure, stock theft, illegal cultivation, among others have led to the deterioration of standards thus negatively affecting the image of the City. The attitude of members of the public as well as some City officials has led to a point whereby Harare has lost its glow. We are determined to bring it back… Harare was renowned for its cleanliness, decency, peace, tranquil environment for business and leisure, therefore we would like to assure all residents that all these illegal activities will be a thing of the past.
There is no doubt that the rise of poverty in Harare was responsible for people embarking on informal sector activities. Yet, it is important to stress, this poverty is not peculiar to Harare alone. There is a general rise of poverty in many cityscapes around the world today, including the developed world. Teitz and Chapple (1998) have attempted to explain this urbanised poverty by giving eight possible explanations based on the example of US inner cities. The eight hypotheses are the endogenous growth deficit resulting from low levels of entrepreneurship and access to capital, the failure of prescribed public policies, profound structural economic shifts eroding away industrial competitiveness of the players, inadequacies in human capital causing serious unemployment challenges, persistence of racial and gender discrimination in employment, complex interaction of culture and behaviour detaching away citizens from formal employment practices, historical constraints perpetuating a spatial mismatch between workers and jobs and consequences of the migration processes aiding gentrification. Although the issue of race is minimal in most African cities, apart from South Africa (Spinks, 2001), other issues explain clearly the presence of high poverty levels in African cities. He further observes that:
Constraints on the ability to coordinate action, to exercise effective influence over policy decisions, to join membership organisations, to advocate better social services, and to resist [the] depredations of police and bureaucrats, are among the features of political life for the urban poor in developing countries.
In this case, the manifestation of material poverty in the lives of urban poor in most developing countries is explained by non-material aspects of knowing and articulating a rights-based push towards being heard and empathised for by the elite and ruling class of the cities and countries alike.
Theory of Anarchy
Anarchy simply the means absence of government which, in turn, implies lawlessness. Ideally, governments are installed to ensure that there is law and its enforcement. Without this structure, society unravels. The problem facing most postcolonial African states is the lack of enforcement of law and byelaws (cf. Tibaijuka, 2005). This emanates from two related issues, that standards set by Western legislation and inherited by African states are too rigid to address the social needs of African society; and that indigenous systems and rules tend to be ‘unequally yoked’ together with such modern rules so that at the end of the day informality prevails against formality (ibid). In most cases, there are powerful individuals and groups who act as though they were the state. The role of the government in a state, as put across by Spinks (2001, p. 3) is that ‘Sovereign government works as a gate-keeper’. Yet governments, whether democratic or autocratic, once in office, tend to serve the interests of the few in the name of public interest (ibid). Anarchy can thus also be viewed as machinery against the retrogressive tendencies of bureaucracy.
In his wrestle against the accumulation of wealth in the hands of a few and institutionalised orders, Pierre-Joseph Proudhon puts across the notion that ‘property is theft. Because ordered institutions were bringing in unjustified accumulations, Proudhon was comfortable with anarchy. When institutions fail to work in keeping with their terms of reference, mistrust and a feeling of victimhood and betrayal sets in. It is a usual approach to regard the state as a demi-God in dealing with the affairs bedevilling society, hence the idea of ‘state failure’ (cf. Tibaijuka, 2005). The concepts of governance, good governance and public–private partnerships or public–community partnerships should be noted as offspring of the idea of anarchism rooted in the perspective that because of state failure and the ineptitude of the state machinery to handle civic issues on its own, the state cannot run it alone (ibid). Hence in recent times, instead of stressing the idea of ‘government’ there has been a new wave with high proclivity towards hailing of ‘governance’ and ‘governability’. The government implied the state apparatus having the final say on all issues in society, including, providing for citizens as emphasised in the 1960s and the 1970s. Governance, on the other hand is a relationship between different institutions—state and non-state—defining and shaping the destiny of citizens together by consensus-seeking (Chirisa & Kawadza, 2011). Finally, governability, relates to the citizens themselves not posing a threat to the agreed milestones hence agreeing to be ‘good citizens’ to ensure peace and development in a locale or state. The two, governance and governability, make the work of government easy hence dispelling negative processes of anarchism like riots and labour militancy.
In the control of ranks (public transport terminals) a group called Chipangano linked to ZANU PF (Zimbabwe African Nation Union Patriotic Front), a party that fought against the whites, was allegedly organising youth into militia groups and terrorising omnibus operators. However ZANU PF has distanced itself from such behaviour (Newsday, 13 August 2012). Whether the gang is linked to the said party or not, state-like persons and groups will always seek to ‘enforce’ their will in the name of the state.
A similar case could be seen in the demolition of houses by the police that took place in Epworth, located some 9 km outside Harare that took place on 15 October 2012. Again, the name of ZANU PF was linked to these ‘illegal’ buildings as groups purporting to represent the party had gone around earlier collecting fees and giving the affected households the go-ahead to build. Individuals and groups presented themselves as bona fide messiahs, only to ditch the ‘recipients’ of their mercy once pressure was applied on them by the state. If the argument that Chipangano had engineered the control of ranks and facilities in Harare was true, then these individuals or groups had taken advantage of the high level of lawlessness that existed in the country. As long as such mafia/groups were in charge of strategic resources in the city then the city would continue to lose out at the expense of the great public. When individuals used the name of a party or public office for personal gain, this was corruption that brought about serious leakages in an economy.
Theory of Leakages and Corruption
Corruption is difficult to define and explain (Aidt, Dutta & Sena, 2008; Amundsen, 1999; Bowles, 1999). Bratsis (2003) contends that not all corruption is undesirable. He assumes a functionalist perspective in which certain dynamics of a place or within a people changes in an environment replete with corrupt tendencies. He makes a distinction between traditional and modern corruption: to the former he ascribes the Leviticus definition of the Bible and to the latter, the modern, he feels is part of the campaign pushed by Washington through the Bretton Woods institutions that redefined economic space by setting parameters of governing public and private life. In contending the public–private spilt of categories, Bratsis (2003, p. 33) argues that:
[t]he purity of the public is specular and illusionary, a performative gesture, a product of a series of rules designed to cloak the fetishistic nature of the public/private split.
Bowles (1999, p. 460) distinguishes corruption from ‘fraud’, ‘embezzlement’ and ‘extortion’ arguing that the ‘… essence of corruption is that two individuals or groups act in concert to further their own interests at the expense of a third party.’ It is thus an act of collusion. Further analysis by Bowles (1999, p. 460) crystallises to the following, that:
[b]oth parties to a corrupt transaction have an incentive to avoid disclosure since both will usually have been acting illegally. Thus, even establishing that it has occurred may be very costly. Even when corruption is suspected it is very often difficult to adduce legally convincing evidence since parties to corrupt transactions can comparatively easily cover their tracks by using tactics which offer ambiguity and are susceptible to multiple explanations. It is not, however, in any respect a ‘victimless crime’.
Amundsen (1999, p. 6) puts across the problem of corruption which he says, ‘… mainly arises in the interaction between government and the market economy where the government itself must be considered endogenous.’ For Aidt Dutta (2008, p. 195), corruption, economic growth and the quality of political institutions are ‘related through a complex web’. The control of facilities by a few individuals means that the city of Harare is losing out showing great evidence of deepening corruption and leakage. Over time, such corruption is a menace to the sustainability of any city. The youth and the unemployed are usually the ‘foot-soldiers’ of corrupt individuals, located somewhere, easy to tell but difficult to identify. Most of the rank marshals seem to belong to groups of youth and the unemployed. The major challenge of chasing them out from the city council facilities, the termini, is that the exercise takes the city to the path of urban gentrification. The sentiments by an operator, quoted in the Daily News of 15 January 2014 are telling: ‘Mushika-shika operates under the nose of the police. There is a police guy who drives a BMW and he gets bribes for kombis and the officer keeps a record of vehicles in mobile phones’.
These sentiments were echoed by the other who said: ‘… we actually pay our money in advance so that we are sensitised if they are coming. When told that they are coming we swiftly move from the place’.
These sentiments reveal that the theory of corruption and leakages hold water in Harare. The fight against touts, illegal ranks and illegal kombis is difficult to win because of rampant corruption. The kombis after being tipped off that the police are coming, move away from illegal pick-up points, divert from the routes being scrutinised by the police or alternatively the touts leave the ranks. The touts are middlemen stationed between the police and kombi operators who negotiate the deals. Also, in case of the kombi being impounded, or touts arrested, they are released when bribes are paid. Corruption is a cancer in the fight against illegal activities in the CBD of Harare.
Theory of Cleaning-Up the City and Urban Gentrification
In 1964, in her book, London: Aspects of Change, Ruth Glass, a British sociologist, coined the term gentrification. For Glass and others who followed her, the term gentrification was the displacement and replacement of the working class by the middle class. It was the territorial invasion of working class housing by the middle class, usually in the name of urban renewal and city beautification. But in the context of this present study, the definition can be extended to mean initiatives for city beautification and programmes and projects that try to exclude the poor (the homeless, vendors and small family business operations) from accessing public spaces especially in the Central Business District, where there were potentially opportunities that could be used as a survival coping strategy (Tevera & Chikanda, 2000). Ideally, gentrification is often triggered by a number of factors including, but not limited to, access to urban centres by way of proximity or transportation networks, suppression of housing costs relative to the wide real estate market, peculiarity in architectural and building merit and the availability of huge rental units in an area where rates could be increased and whose structures could be converted into condominiums (ibid). From a local government perspective, the idea was usually to raise taxes, hence ‘capturing’ the value of properties by betterment. Theories of gentrification are taxonomised into demand-side and supply side (İlkuçan, 2004).
Harare, in recent times, has seen efforts to exclude the poor from the city. The most quoted example is the 2005 Operation Murambatsvina; the idea behind which was to restore order in the country’s urban areas so that the past glory apparent under colonial rule could be revived (Chirisa, 2012). The operation, however, was highly criticised given the fact that it was highly militarised and failed to be sympathetic towards the citizens’ survival coping strategies under difficult conditions which included rising poverty as well as the state’s failure to cushion them against these changes (Tibaijuka, 2005). It has been noted that ‘… although squatters do not pay formal rent to an owner, they incur costs associated with squatting, including possible payments made to a community ‘leader’ (ibid).
Today, most governments weigh the trade-off between permitting squatters to stay and evicting them. Mass eviction is always too costly to be manageable. Not only is eviction costly to the government but also to the household evicted. The irony of such blitzes against vendors in Harare’s city centre is that unlike in housing where squatters can look out for an alternative place to reside, vendors always get back to the city centre like homing pigeons. In fact, they even strategise to out manoeuvre the municipal administration’s plans and naturalise their activities (Chirisa, 2012). The vendors are convinced that they have the right to the city centre for their business as much as every Zimbabwean. Those in the villages also strongly believe that they can re-locate to an urban centre as it is their constitutional right and one of the privileges of getting independence.
These beliefs are in keeping with the Right-to-the-City concept articulated by Henry Lefebvre and advanced by David Harvey (Afenah, 2011). It is an issue of citizen rights. So in fact, chasing away the youth and the unemployed from the ranks without providing them with an alternative employment and related opportunities is actually self-defeating for the state. Overall, there is a high unemployment rate in Harare let alone the country at large. Denying a foothold in the city to the unemployed is a violation of Lefebvre’s postulation of right to the city. In such a scenario, the controversial economic empowerment and indigenisation policy by the Zimbabwean government remains a pie in the sky dream, a fantasy if you will, given that it is ill-conceived, underfunded and badly strategised.
Theory of Travelling: The Theory of Planned Behaviour
The Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) postulates that the travel intentions or behaviours of an individual are affected, also, by factors outside of the control of the concerned individual (Singleton, 2013). Travel choices are influenced by many factors outside the control of the individual, including intra-and inter-household interactions, the built and natural environments, capability constraints and (while travelling) the decisions of other travellers (ibid). These factors influence the perception of behavioural control which, in turn, affects intention and travel choices. A series of studies successfully applied the theory of planned behaviour directly to travel mode choice analyses and interventions. These studies found that attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control on intentions, and of intentions on behaviour, supporting the TPB hypothesis that intention mediates these relationships with behaviour.
Applying this to the Harare context, the choice of travel mode is by enlarge influenced by environmental conditions rather than the individual. So despite emerging illegal ranks which are characterised by noisy touts, lack of comfort and are highly risky they are still populated with patrons. The movement of compliance to touts and use of illegal ranks is shaped by the environment. Some commuters said in the Daily News of 15 January 2014, ‘We use those ranks because that is where many people are. Makombi anokurumidza kuzara ikoko (the kombis have a small waiting time). Such sentiments show that many people follow other people’s travel behaviour. Their travel mode or choice of termini is not influenced so much by the location of ranks but by following others, being persuaded by touts and convenience. Of course, the Harare City Council feels that if the public were to shun illegal operators and the undesignated pick-up points then the mushika-shika and illegal ranks would naturally eliminated. The Council in the Herald (2016, 16 September) said, ‘We have amended the city traffic bye-laws and this will allow us to clamp down on these illegal car operators’. This move by the Council was to try and influence the travel choice of the people by placing a limitation on the sites or ranks which seemed to offer opportunities.
Conclusion and Policy Alternatives
There are many theories which can explain the situation as it exists in the city of Harare today. The foregoing paragraphs have attempted to develop a patterned argument of the observed phenomena and the empirical theories that exists. It is to be noted that these explanations are interwoven to show the web of complexity that defines this African city. It should be noted that the story of the touts and control of public facilities by private entities in complete disregard of public institutional setting is nothing but the tip of an iceberg under which issues of great profundity deserve serious scrutiny and analysis. Indeed, ignoring such scrutiny and analysis is self-defeating to a people and city aspiring sustainability in the 21 century. Such an analysis is critical for introspection and formulating workable solutions to the urban crisis in Harare and similar cities on the continent.
Emanating from this study, the following policy alternatives are critical: a revisit and review of government policy on urban development and urban youth; empowering the city of Harare to deal effectively with matters within its jurisdiction such as urban police power (development control), adopting a governance approach so that citizens have a sense of being citizens and fully responsible, and, the city crafting clear fiscal policy that defines the expected proceeds from its facilities as well as dealing effectively with corruption by gangs and mafias. Overall, these strategies work better if the macro-environment and the role of the state in urban policy are re-engineered to be accommodative and strategically. The city of Harare has no option but to fully ‘capitalise’ its management and develop control mechanisms if the unruliness posed by touts is to be curbed substantially. There is no doubt that Harare’s sustainability hinges on the correct placement of the story of touts and the control of facilities. It is just an aspect of a bigger story in which there are deep-rooted factors whose theoretical explanations define the exact dynamics of the city. The story of Harare is the story of the majority of cities that dot the developing world.