MBABANE – The Eswatini business community has reacted with concern to an impending border blockade of the country organised by South African truck drivers. The purpose of the strike action, called for September 9, is to forbid foreign drivers from working in SA and to ban foreign-registered commercial vehicles from using SA roads. Although all countries bordering SA are subject to the blockade, the landlocked countries embedded within SA, Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) and Lesotho, will be most severely impacted. Eswatini depends on road freight to import most food and goods, and all fuel and medicines. “The blockade will not only bring economic ruin to the country – an end of all trade – but will lead to a humanitarian crisis,” said Paul Magongo, a bank manager in Manzini. ”The South African truckers say only South Africans can use the roads there. Does this mean goods must be transferred at the border? Trucks take goods 15 kilometres from Mbabane to the Oshoek border, and then they must be offloaded?” asked Colin Abner, a driver for Maqalf Transport who daily takes loads from Matsapha to Gauteng. In an interview with FTW, Musa Maseko, trade and business support coordinator at Federation of Eswatini Employers/Chamber of Commerce in Mbabane, said: “We keep in contact with our members (the country’s major business owners) and we’re telling them not to panic. But there is no denying the seriousness of the threat.” Eswatini road transport firms and their drivers have been particularly on edge throughout the year as violence against foreign drivers has made their profession perilous. Thus far, Swazi drivers have been spared because they are driving Eswatiniregistered vehicles and are not working for SA trucking firms. At illegal roadblocks, vigilantes check the licences of all drivers they suspect are foreign nationals. However, the new demand of the SA trucking community that even Swazi trucks be banned ensures trouble when the drivers cross the border into what is increasingly hostile territory. “I’m scared,” admits Abner. Maseko says aside from issues of legality and fair trade, the fairness issue bothers Swazis. “They won’t allow foreigners to drive on South African roads, but they want to freely drive on the roads of all other countries.”