Zim slaps excessive fines on foreign truckers

THE ZIMBABWEAN traffic authorities seem to have been overcome by their own attack of xenophobia in recent weeks, blaming foreign truckers for damage to the road network and slapping on government revised fines for overloading – which are “excessive” enough to put small and medium-sized operators out of business, according to the Road Transport Operators' Association (RTOA) of Malawi. RTOA executive director, Shadreck Matsimbe, revealed that more than 50 Malawian trucks had been impounded in Zimbabwe in recent times,and faced overloading fines. In his calculation, he converted the Zimbabwean authorities’ announced fine of Z$120 000 000/kilogram by the declared Zimbabwe exchange rate of Z$525 000/ US$1 – and worked out the fine levels as approximately US$228.50/kg or R1 748.57/kg. However, one Carlos Almeida, of Almeida Transport in Lilongwe, told Malawi’s The Nation that three of his vehicles had been impounded – one with a 30-kg overload facing a fine of US$9 167; one with a 50-kg overload a fine of US$12 000; and one with a 450-kg overload a whopping US$93 000 fine. This, Almeida added, being more than such a truck costs. A Johannesburg-based haulier told FTW trucks from Johannesburg had also been hit with fines – one stated to be US$92 000 and demanded in foreign exchange. According to a well placed source, trucks leave Johannesburg and pass through various weighbridges without a problem until they reach the border where they’re calculated to be over the limit. “On the Malawi side it reached a crisis point recently where there were 50 trucks parked. We lobbied the government in Malawi through the road traffic association and got the ministers of transport talking. Only then were the vehicles released, some of which were stuck there for three weeks. “We used to load 30 tons but we dropped to 29 tons because we can’t afford to have vehicles stopped,” he told FTW. Trying to sort out this business-busting issue, the Malawi RTOA has been in communication with the country’s secretary for transport; secretary for trade and industry; the Malawi high commissioner to Zimbabwe; and the Zimbabwe high commissioner to Malawi, complaining about these “excessive fines” being imposed on foreign trucks, when Zimbabwe trucks committing the same offence were being fined “almost nothing”, according to Matsimbe. The RTOA has also put the issue before the Federation of Eastern and Southern African Road Transport Associations (Fesarta). But, although FTW managed to have a brief telephone conversation with Fesarta executive officer, Barney Curtis, in Lusaka and he suggested that certain changes had been made, he was unable to give us revised figures until his return to his Johannesburg office. He was unavailable before our print deadline.