Published: 10 June 2013

IT'S just after sunset and temperatures are fast dropping to almost freezing point at Park Station in Johannesburg, South Africa.

The chilly weather is making everyone numb.

But Sandra Phiri from Bulawayo's Entumbane suburb will have to endure two nights sleeping at the open bustling station.

She would be in South Africa for two days to buy goods for re-sale back in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second largest city.

The 39-year-old Phiri is a cross border trader, who occasionally leaves the comfort of her six-roomed and fully-furnished house, to endure the hardships of sleeping in an open space in a desperate bid to make a living.

Phiri is one of hundreds of Zimbabweans, the majority of them women, who have temporarily converted the Park Station into their "mini-bedrooms".

The mother of three says she has lost count how many times she has slept at the busy station as she cannot afford a decent accommodation in Johannesburg, the commercial hub of South Africa.

She decided to venture into cross border trade after losing her formal job in 2008. Since then, she has been travelling to countries in the Sadc region buying goods for resale back home.

"I used to work for a textile company in Bulawayo and I got retrenched when the company faced viability challenges," she said.

"I sleep here at the Park Station almost four times a month. I have no money to book in a lodge or hotel let alone have somewhere else to put up for the night."

In countries such as Mozambique or Zambia, Phiri said, she secures temporary lodgings under squalid conditions in a bid try to minimise accommodation costs.

At times, she buys her goods in Musina town at the border with Zimbabwe.

When The Standard crew arrived at the Musina Border post one night recently, scores of women and men were like abandoned bags of maize, fast asleep on the pavements as they waited for the next day for shops to open.

Marvelous Tshuma, another cross border trader from Gweru, said besides the accommodation challenges, they faced a plethora of problems such as ill treatment by authorities.

"I am in this business not by choice but due to circumstances," said Tshuma. "The working conditions are not good at all. The problems start from obtaining a passport document itself where we have to endure several months before one gets it."

The former Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe clerk said most cross border traders were abused in the hands of authorities while in foreign lands.

"We are harassed while in other countries especially in South African by its customs and police officials who are very hostile and have negative attitude towards us, she said.

"We are subjected to humiliating body searches in the hands of South African police and this lowers our dignity as human beings."

Some of the traders complained about what they termed "excessive customs duty charges" which they said were pushing them out of business.

"We face unwarranted impounding of goods and we are often misconstrued as smugglers and drug traffickers," said one cross border trader, who only identified herself as Thandiwe.

Some of the traders import their goods from countries such as Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia, Mozambique, Namibia Dubai, Malaysia, and China.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) says cross-border trade was a high-risk venture involving corruption, sexual abuse and other forms of human rights violations.
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