Smugglers have new cargo of choice

Date: 22 September 2017 By: 

Forget about cigarettes as the preferred cargo of smugglers. A new kid on the block has appeared, called Chibuku Super.

This brand of opaque sorghum beer is worth quite a lot to Zimbabweans wanting to make easy money. Not only is it worth its weight in gold (with some sellers making more than 200% profit), it is also a safer bet than cigarettes, which is under close scrutiny by the authorities. An article by Pamela Kelets that appeared in GroundUp reports on this popular beer being sold in Springs.

Kelets interviewed a seller called Tracy (not her real name) about the beer that is manufactured by Delta Breweries. They are reportedly Zimbabwe’s largest beer maker. The beer is bottled in two-litre plastic bottles and is especially popular with Zimbabwean immigrants, many of whom are miners, living in towns such as Springs in Gauteng.

Tracy initially sold groundnuts from Zimbabwe to South Africa, but quickly discovered that Super was a much more lucrative business for her. “We purchase Super beer in bulk at discount rates in Zimbabwe by lying to wholesalers that we are bar owners. Each bottle costs us just 70 US cents,” says Tracy. She then sells it for US$2.50 (R33) a bottle in South Africa.

But how is Tracy able to get her product into South Africa?

In Zimbabwe, the beer crates are loaded into the cargo section of South Africa-bound buses. The legal limit for beer at the border is 2.5 litres per traveller. “As usual, bus drivers and touts are our salvation,” said Tracy. “We pay them so that whenever they encounter Zimbabwe police roadblocks, they lie that the beer is headed for Beit Bridge and won’t cross into South Africa.”

Upon arrival at Beit Bridge, people carry the beer on foot across the Limpopo River. “If the water levels in Limpopo are shallow, as they are now in summer, porters will charge us R100 for every 60 bottles they carry into South Africa,” she says. Smugglers such as Tracy don’t risk it themselves as there are robbers, known as guma-guma, who prey on immigrants crossing into South Africa through the dense bush. Instead, Tracy continues by bus.

“We complete all immigration passport formalities, and meet the beer couriers on South African territory, five kilometres outside Musina town,” she says.

Denis Juru of the Zimbabwe International Cross Border Traders Association Union in Musina told GroundUp: “It’s crazy. But it has suddenly become a money spinner for porters who can brave crossing the Limpopo River on foot.”

After arriving in South Africa, the beer gets distributed all over the country Africa via the taxi network.

Tracy said immigrants, many of whom mine for gold in abandoned shafts, are her main market. She described her business as brisk. “I can sell 100 bottles in a day,” said Tracy. Some shebeens also buy the beer from her.

“Police here in Springs don’t care or know that this is beer. They just think these are opaque milk drinks,” she added. “It is not my duty to enforce rules; I am just a beer seller.”

The orignal article appeared on GroundUp's website on 15 September and can be read by logging on to www.groundup.org.za

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