By SAM PHIRI –
A FIFTEEN-YEAR-OLD boy shocked people when he was discovered to have travelled from Lundazi to Lusaka on a bus chassis.
The visibly distressed, soiled and hungry Frederick Mbewe was discovered by taxi drivers who were offloading luggage from the bus at Juldan Motors bus stop along Lusaka’s Freedom Way.
Mbewe from Chief Magodi’s area said he decided to take the highly risky initiative of hiding and travelling under a bus because he had no money for a bus fair.
The teenager was headed for Solwezi to find his mother, a Ms Charity Ngulube whom he said was married to a Mr Misheck Chinyundu, a worker at Kalumbila Mines.
Mbewe said his decision to take such a risky venture was arrived at after he was encircled in abject poverty and hunger after the demise of his only guardian-the grandmother.
The boy narrated that he started off from his village around 03:00 hours to take a brave 13-hour-walk to the bus station in Lundazi town.
“I had to wait at the station for the 01:00 hours bus to Lusaka, so around 23:00 hours, I managed to sneak under the bus and found some space between the rear wheels, the journey was painful but what could I have done? ” he said.
Driver of the bus, Shadreck Musatwe said he could not believe that the boy arrived alive in Lusaka bearing in mind the dusty condition under a high-speed moving bus and in mostly bumpy areas.
“I thank God that this boy is alive because had he died, it would have been a very big issue where we could have even been linked to rituals,” he said.
The teenager was by press time taken to Millennium Police Post for questioning although the move was opposed by many suggesting that he had not committed a crime but that he was under undue pressure.