Beitbridge Border Post – travellers’ nightmare

By Thupeyo Muleya and Obert Chifamba

Banners inscribed "We Are Here To Serve" greet the visitor at the reception desk of any Zimbabwe Revenue Authority office throughout the country.

Psychologically, this prepares the visitor for an on-the-dot type of service, which sadly, is yet to be witnessed since Zimra’s inception in 2001.

A lot of people, for instance business executives and importers have been left licking bruised egos over the revenue authority’s shoddy services.

It has become a nightmare for people to import goods into the country because of the treatment they get from Zimra, especially at Beitbridge Border Post.

Last month, the parastatal left vehicle importers fuming after it moved the clearances of all imported cars from their premises to a private company without even advising them.

Just recently, the organisation re-shuffled its officers at the border post and the ensuing service delivery style exposed that some of the officers were not even conversant with their new tasks.

The bulk of the parastatal’s departments are manned by arrogant officers who take their time to respond to enquiries, that is, if they do not refer the matter to the next officer who will in turn find a heap of excuses for not giving prompt service.

In the end, most people have left their businesses unfinished in frustration. The example of one gentleman who wanted to redeem part of the proceeds realised from the sale of his vehicle quickly comes into the picture.

"They advised me that they would process everything within two weeks after which they would get back to me. Now it is over a month and I have been referred from one officer to another- all professing to be doing ‘something’ about the matter.

"After going through three different officers, I was finally referred to the warehouse manager who then told me to wait for yet another two weeks. This will now make it two months and they say they are still trying to reconcile the two different schedules they used during the auctioning of the vehicles," the irate man commented.

The visibly irate man added that at one point one of the officers even sounded furious over the phone and was quick to say that the person who was supposed to do the job was away.

It is fast becoming apparent that there is lack of monitoring of officers in most departments where they seem to have been given free reign to frighten and frustrate clients. The motor vehicle valuations and the revenue officers top the list of these notorious officers.

At some point last year the Shipping and Forwarding Agents’ Association of Zimbabwe called for the establishment of a border control authority at Beitbridge border post in a move that it felt would help to improve efficiency at the country’s busiest port of entry

The SFAAZ chief executive, Joseph Musariri bemoaned the status quo where there is no lead agency running the affairs at the border post.

He said the Government should look into the issue as a matter of urgency.

He also called on the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority to adopt the specialisation concept, which was formerly used, by the then customs and taxes units prior to its establishment.

"We are urging Zimra to have specialist officers to deal with certain areas of operations. This idea of moving officers from one department to another is only nurturing inefficiency. At some point you will come across a Zimra officer not even conversant with what is expected of him and this is causing unnecessary delays and confusion," he said.

They should classify them into revenue specialists, taxes, customs and excise, vehicles, administration and operations rather than operate as they are doing at the moment.

These officers’ functions should be clearly outlined and there is serious need for Zimra to re organise themselves and have carrier customs and taxes officers, he said.

Additionally, SFAAZ members were more than ready to support the creation of such an authority, he commented.

At the moment any department at the border can implement their programmes at will regardless of the effects on the other parties.

"We are really concerned by the current situation at Beitbridge border post where everyone thinks they can implement their programmes regardless of their effects on other members of society.

"As SFAAZ, we want a situation whereby we have an identified lead agent or have a port control authority which deals specifically with issues regarding the operations at this entry point," commented Musariri.

South Africa has this authority on their sides and it makes it easy to deal with some operational and administrative issues, he further explained.

He said such a port authority would deal with operations, administrative, security and health matters among other issues.

Musariri said some of the delays and inefficiencies in some departments at this entry point were a result of lack of monitoring; adding that with the establishment of the authority service delivery was bound to improve.

An average of 25 000 people and between 3 000 and 4 000 vehicles pass through the border post everyday.

Of late congestion had become the order of the day at the port with travellers and importers all putting the blame squarely on Zimra and other service providers at the border.

However, Zimra say some of the delays were a result of human resources shortages. Currently, they have a staff complement of 120 whereas they need 400 officers to operate at full strength.

This shortage of manpower has also given leeway to the current crop of Zimra officers who want "push money" to expedite their services.

Musariri’s association has also been urging the Government to re-open the Old Limpopo Bridge under the Beitbridge Efficiency Management Programme to reduce human and vehicular congestion.

They further argued that there was also need for the recapitalisation of the National Railways of Zimbabwe as that was going to ensure a faster and efficient movement of cargo.

The other issue Musariri decried was the proliferation of some government agencies at the border charging exorbitant prices for their services, which created enormous delays in the movement of cargo.

"Some functions and services duplicate each other and we believe there should be a review with some of the revenue collection tasks taken back to Zimra," he said.

He added that his association was also lobbying for local authorities at most ports of entry to avail land for office and house construction for their members. The unavailability of accommodation, he said was also affecting their discharging of duties.

On his recent familiarisation tour of the Beitbridge Border Post, Finance Minister Tendai Biti indicated that 30 percent of Government revenue came from Zimra and from that percentage, 70 percent came from Beitbridge.

In most cases, two or three officers are tasked with clearing travellers either on the green or red route zones. The green route is for those travellers without anything to declare while the red route is for those with something to declare.

Last year, Zimra even took its revenue collection to the country’s major highways and mounted roadblocks as many people sought to evade tedious clearing and customs process at the borders.

It was only after the intervention of the then Minister of State in the Prime Minister’s office Gorden Moyo that the cross border traders were let off the noose.

Zimra had made it a priority to mount roadblocks to search all cross border buses along highways that lead to major cities from Beitbridge border post

This was despite the fact that all the buses would have undergone a thorough search at the border post and endured long hours of waiting to be attended to.

l tupeyo@operamail.com or obert.chifamba@zimpapers.co.zw
published by; The Herald, 6 July 2010