THERE is a saying in Bemba which goes: Uubomba mwibal alya mwibala. Literally translated, this means he who works in the farm eats what is produced in the farm.
But euphemistically, this means that a person who works in a certain place steals from the same place.
Indeed, many workers go with this euphemism. They have cultivated a habit of making extra bucks from their work places even when their employers pay them good money.
The habit of stealing from work places for an extra buck, which is usually spent on leisure, has become so common to many that they would not want to stay away from work even when they were supposed to be off duty all because they wanted to knock off with something in their pockets.
Some continue to be dedicated to duty even when their wages were very little because at the end of the day they were knocking off with more money than those who were getting good salaries, while others were not satisfied with the money they got and even after stealing from their work places, they demanded that their salaries be increased because they were getting peanuts.
Because of some workers’ stealing habits, some Zambian and Asian employers do not even pay their workers because they find that every day, they incur a lot of shortages because of thefts.
The thieving workers don’t even complain when their employers deduct the money equivalent to the shortages because they know that they will still have more money after playing their cards right.
Yes, money is never enough but there is a limit for its need especially when you know that you make more than what you deserve dubiously.
A few weeks ago, I was in Ndeke Township in Ndola where I had gone to visit some two friends.
After paying a visit, one of the friends suggested on escorting me that we pass by one of the bars to have one for the road. The time was 16.00 hours and I thought this was not too early and not too late to have a beer.
We got at one of the bars and found ourselves where to sit and one of the friends went to the counter and ordered the drinks – it was Windhoek as usual for me while my friends were on Castle Lager.
We were taking our beer and discussing when a tall man, his chin heavily bearded walked in.
He paced to and from -probably looking for someone who appeared not to be around. The man walked out and came back after 20 minutes later.
He walked to the counter and whispered something to the bar man. Again the man walked out. It was when he had left when one man who was known to my two friends commented that the man who had left was now facing reality the hard way.
Facing reality the hard way? What did this mean?
“He used to have a lot of money but he was never satisfied,” the man said as he picked his beer and had a swig.
What was this man trying to say? It seemed my two friends he was talking to were not interested to hear anything from him.
But as an eavesdropper, I was very interested in such topics. How was I going to urge this man who did not even know me explain what he knew about that man? How was that man facing reality the hard way and why was he not satisfied with a lot of money he had?
I whispered to one of my friends to find out whether he knew anything about what the man was saying about the man who had walked out.
My friend said he did not know much about the man except that he had been fired from where he was working because of stealing.
Then my friend turned to the man who was trying to explain and asked him why the man had been fired.
“No, he was not fired. The owner of the trucks he used to work for decided to sell the trucks and he has now gone into bus business because truck drivers had stolen too much from him,” the man who seemed to know the background of the former truck driver explained.
He continued to explain that this was the second time that the truck driver had lost his job because of the love of money.
The man narrated that the first time the truck driver lost his job was when he organised his fellow truck drivers that they should demand for an increase in their wages because the money they were getting was too little compared to the job they were doing transporting goods to and from various countries across Africa.
His friends were against the idea because they knew that they were making a lot more carrying and ferrying goods privately after company business.
“He thought his friends were cowards and he decided to go it alone,” explained the man.
According to the narrator, what happened was that the truck driver approached the owner of the trucks and protested that the money he and his fellow drivers were getting was too little and he should increase or else they would leave for greener pastures.
The owner of the trucks knew that the truck drivers were making more money than their salaries but he did not care as long as they did company work by delivering the good to their destinations.
He knew that on their way back when the trucks were empty, the drivers privately ferried goods for many people including marketeers who go to so many places to order things like bags of maize, beans, groundnuts, cassava, and many others to various places and the money they charged was theirs.
When the man approached the owner of the trucks and complained about the slave wages, the proprietor politely told the man to quit if he was not happy with what he was getting.
“You are a truck driver and you say you get very little money? What about those goods you ferry privately, don’t you get all that money which you make on one trip or three or five times more than your salary. You go and find a job elsewhere,” the man explained that the truck owner told the truck driver.
Meanwhile, there was another truck owner who had three trucks and he was looking for competent drivers because he had won contracts from various companies in Ndola to ferry retirees to their provinces after retirement.
The man was one of the drivers who easily got that job.
But because he knew all the tricks in the book, he found a loophole and he started making more money than the salary he was offered.
What was happening was that when someone was on repatriation after retirement, the company he was working for would book those trucks and the companies paid the trucker through the bank.
The agreement was to take the people who were being repatriated from  onetown center to another town center. That is from boma to boma. If they were going in the hinterlands, they had to look for other transport.
But once they reached the boma, the drivers sweet talked the retirees into taking them right into their villages at another cost which was usually more than they paid to reach the boma because of the bad conditions of the roads.
The money the retirees would top up was not known to the owner of the trucks.
This money went into the pockets of the drivers. That, plus their salaries, was a lot of money.
Through this craftiness, many drivers made a lot of money and those who were wise managed to buy themselves some light trucks and employed people to work for them while others managed to build houses which they put on rent.
However, the narrator was explaining, one day that truck driver fell sick and there was a retiree who was to be repatriated to Petauke in eastern province. The other two trucks were also out of station delivering goods.
It was because of this that the owner of the trucks had to be on duty to ferry the retiree and his family to Petauke.
When they reached the boma  and they were to offload the goods from the truck, the call boys approached the driver whom they did not know was the owner of the truck and they asked him where the usual driver was.
The man told the call boys that the usual driver was sick and this was why he had taken charge.
“Bafunseni kwamene bayenda mupitilize nawo. Ndalama zamene muzabalipilisa ni zanu. Mwine wa galimoto saziziwa. Ise muzatipasako cabe kan’gono. Nimwamene achitila anzanu,” (ask them where they are going and you continue with the journey. The money you will charge them will be yours and the truck owner will not know about it. You will just give us a bit. That is how your friends make money).
Before the owner of the truck could say anything, the call boys found out where the retiree and his family were going and since they knew the destination, they also knew how much the retiree would top up. They told the driver/owner of the truck how much he would benefit.
It was quite a lot of money from the boma to the hinterland. He agreed with the deal and took the retiree and his family many kilometres away from the boma.
He was accompanied by some of the call boys who knew the geography of the area and he paid what they charged him for accompanying him and offloading the goods when they reached the destination.
What the owner of the truck discovered was that his drivers were making more money than he was as the transporter. He also discovered that his drivers had accrued a lot of properties including houses which were on rent.
It was because of this that when he got back to Ndola, he decided to terminate the contracts with the companies to repatriate the retirees.
He sold the trucks and went into bus business. He did not consider his former drivers for jobs and it was for this that the man in discussion lost his job.
Unfortunately, this man did not buy any property and he was staying in a rented house. Now he has no money and he just roams about as no job comes his way.
Comments:
potipher2014@gmail.com
or 0955929796,0966278597