Three times this past week food vendors across the city were raided by city council by-law officers accompanied by members of the Botswana Police Service. They confiscated our food and equipment. In addition to that they fined us P200s under some very vague act that they claim we have trespassed. The official line now is that if one is caught again, not only will he/she be fined P500, you will be detained and your equipment and food confiscated. It begs the question, is there real legal justification for that? Well our esteemed officers will tell you that the law is the law and they are just enforcing it.
When one sifts through the waffle that gets said upon being arrested, there is reference to the Trade and Liquor act. By the way the Trade and Liquor Act book does not even get printed nor sold anymore at Government Printers. But anyway we are told that it says people should be arrested if they trade without a license. Ok, then we are saying, give us licenses! Or is that too much to ask for? The fact is we are here, we are trading and we are not going anywhere. The annoying thing about these phantom licenses is that even if you applied for one you will never get it, which is why nobody has it. I applied for it and was turned down, a friend of mine who has been trading for more than 10 years has applied for it on numerous occasions and he still doesn't have it. Those in the know tell us that you need to bribe someone at council or be a relation to someone who works there to ever stand a chance of getting one. But in all fairness I don't think anybody out there who is hawking or vending has the license. Hence these guys can just come and raid people indiscriminately.
