Vendors in Norton in retaliation against policeman

By Lance Guma
31 October 2005

For weeks on end they were brutalised by heavily armed police units while their homes and vending stalls were destroyed during the government's operation Murambatsvina. In an amazing turning of the tables this Friday however, a lone policeman who tried to confiscate soap and cooking oil from so called 'illegal' vendors in Norton's' Katanga suburb was given a taste of his own medicine.

Irate vendors who witnessed his feeble attempt to 'steal' their wares, as they put it, under the guise he was enforcing the law, set on him and gave him a thorough beating. Only the intervention of a passing police truck with half a dozen officers saved his life. The visibly shaken policeman, whose uniform was torn to pieces and had a swollen face was whisked away in the police truck straight to the hospital.

A resident who witnessed the beating said corrupt policemen were now seizing goods belonging to vendors and simply taking them to their homes. Soaring commodity prices and low salaries for policemen have forced them into corrupt activities as a way of making ends meet.

On Monday the situation was tense with reports that running battles between vendors and policemen in Norton were still ongoing as a result of Friday's incident. The police in the area are intent on exacting revenge on behalf of their colleague, said one resident who was boarding a bus when the scuffles broke out. The vendors on the other hand are now organising defence units and hitting back. Under the controversial operation 'Murambatsvina', 700 000 people were rendered homeless as police units razed their homes to the ground on the pretext the structures were illegal. Vendors who relied on selling their wares for a living also had their vending stalls destroyed with authorities saying they wanted to clear up all the slums and dirty vending sites in the cities. Government spin doctors through various media outlets later admitted the operation was meant as a pre-emptive strike against a possible opposition led revolt over soaring inflation in the country.