Suburban
Michael Laban Suburban Correspondent
I went to our company annual day-out a couple of weeks ago, just south of Harare. I went down Twentydales Road, through Hatfield.
What a contrast to the northern suburbs! This is residential. Entirely. And low density. And green leafy. There are shops and fuel stations — at designated places. There are wide verges, with no trucks parked on them. No mechanics changing tyres. No tuck shops. No vendors.
The verges are wide and clear. No mud. No open trenches. No mud depressions from ill-filled trenches or from heavy lorries turning on soft soil.
No cars parked or abandoned. No green lawns, but no unkempt verges. No tall weeds. No straggling undergrowth. No overgrown hedges. It is all mown, trimmed, regular and tended.
There are no bags of uncollected refuse. No litter left-overs from bags of uncollected refuse that have been torn open. There is also no casually thrown litter. No beer bottles dropped out of windows from evening parked cars that have been turned into bars.
The road is nice! No potholes. Edges intact. No dips and humps from old trenches.
So I have to wonder why.
No heavy trucks using it as a highway would explain the good state of the road.
Do they all pay their rates, and get good, regular, City of Harare refuse collection? (It is a long way from Pomona.) That would explain no bags of uncollected refuse and left-over, randomly spread, refuse. Or are they just decent, clean folks? Not “lower than pigs and dogs”, as former President Robert Mugabe liked to call some people. That might explain the lack of general litter and the unwatered but well-tended look.
Is it because it is actually residential? So people treat it like home, not a place to do business.
Whether selling things no one wants or needs, fixing vehicles that should be scrapped but can be made to take another 24 fee paying people two more kilometers, or renting out accommodation where the short term “return” is more important than maintenance or repair.
Or are they so poor and neglected that there is no working water or sewerage network? No one can afford trenched fibre internet connection? They generate no rubbish?
There certainly seems to be different values and standards down there.
Michael Laban is a resident of Ward 7 (Avondale).
