#WeAreVendors trying to make an honest living.

Another chilly winter morning dawns, vendors quickly make their way to the various streets in central Harare.

When they get there alas, some of their wares have been burnt to ashes. Persons unknown have carried out the heinous act. Most sit down on the frigid curb, lost for words. The bales of second-hand clothes smuggled from Mozambique, Zambia or South Africa for sums between $200 and $250 gone up in some. Raising such sums again in this depressed economy will be a tough battle.

The prevailing attitude is one of defiance, “We won’t retreat "," what else can we do.” For a decade or more most of these informal traders have been eking out a livelihood from the overcrowded streets of Harare. The powers-that -be have pronounced that the city centre has go be cleared so as to decongest the streets as well as for hygienic purposes. These vendors have become an eye-sore.

So the cat and mouse between the Harare City Council Police as well as the Zimbabwe Republic Police has to play out as most vendors now resort to selling out of their bags or the boot of parked cars. When the whistling starts most make hasty retreats to safer environs ,where they start acting nonchalantly, behaving as if they window shopping, until the cost is clear so they can resume the clandestine selling .

To date 12 vendors have been arrested according to Promise Mkwanazi ,of the Zimbabwe Informal Sector organization, who insists the reason for people selling on the city streets is "...to define it correctly... There are no jobs."

Whilst it is true that vending causes chaos on the city streets, the overwhelming facts are that people have to earn an honest living somehow.
Written By: Patrick Gwangwara