The Ndola City Council and ZESCO appeared to have conspired one day and unleashed havoc on some rental and bill defaulters in Ndola in the 90s. POTIPHER TEMBO was one of those affected and here’s his report.

I DON’T know if it was happening in other cities and towns, but if you are a Ndola resident, you must remember how accurate the Ndola City Council (NCC) were in evicting tenants who defaulted in paying their rentals and how swift the Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO) were in disconnecting those who did not pay their bills on time.
It happened to me way back in the 1990s when the council and ZESCO simultaneously evicted and disconnected me at the then council and now my house.
Three families in my neighbourhood in the same line were on that fateful day also evicted from their houses for failing to pay rent for two months and I was among the three families.
A squad of NCC police (they were referred to as ‘bakanyangu’) and some council housing officers used to pounce on unsuspecting rental defaulters from as early as 05.00 hours because some of those who knew they would pounce would  desert their homes from as early as that time.
In my case, it was around 07.00 hours when I was going to the bath room to have a shower and prepare to go for work when I heard a loud bang, not a knock, but a bang at the front door and I wondered who could be knocking like that at that time of the day.
Could it be the police? I did not remember having committed any offence and so I thought I was an innocent person as I walked to the door and opened it.
Just as I opened the door, I was faced by three NCC police officers and about five other housing officers. One of them was a very well-known friend of mine.
Before I could say anything, one of them asked me for receipts of the previous two months.
Indeed, I had paid for the other month, but I had not paid for the previous and current months, which meant I was in arrears for two months.
As I was getting to the bed room to fetch the receipts, the NCC police officers and the other four housing officers started removing goods from my sitting room.
This meant they were sure I was in arrears whether I had proof or otherwise of having paid. For them to ask me for receipts was just an academic exercise.
As I returned from the bedroom with a receipt of the previous month, quite a number of goods, including the dilapidated sofas had already forcibly been removed from the house!
Meanwhile, I could hear some neighbours and children outside derisively cheering: “Lelo, lelo, lelo, lelo!”.
I heard one female neighbour laughing and commenting: “Lelo twalamona amabedi ne fipuna bakwata” (today we will see what kind of beds and furniture  they have).
True, my set of Rexin sofas had clearly seen better days and seemingly outlived their usefulness, while the beds were those made of steel bars and chains.
But don’t laugh at me; I’d inherited the sofas from my father when I just started work and plans were underway for me to replace them with new modern furniture. In fact, I had already started paying for the new sofas on lay- by arrangements, but was this really an issue?
Was this something which neighbours could surely be rejoicing about?, I wondered.
I produced the receipt and showed it to one of the officers and after checking it, he told me that I was in two months arrears.
I tried to explain to the friend who was among the squad that I be excused and be given a few days in which to clear the arrears, but this friend pretended not to  know me. A friend in need?
I pleaded with the council police officers and the housing officers, but my pleas fell on deaf ears.
Presently, my wife who had  given birth only a week ago, was being ordered to get out of the house as  the innocent one week old baby girl  cried her lungs out.
To tell you the truth, this made very good entertainment to some of my sadistic neighbours who revelled in my misfortune with uncontrollable laughter.
After the council eviction squad had done the damage- completely removing my property from the house, one of them produced a big Yale, or was it a Union lock and locked the house.
Hardly two minutes elapsed when the squad had left my house to go and evict the second victim-my next- door neighbour- than I heard the  sound of a Land Rover chugging on the road outside my yard.
I realised that it was a green and orange ZESCO power- cut vehicle (the sight of this type of vehicle was not uncommon in townships then).
Four men disembarked from the vehicle and brought down a ladder from the top of the Land Rover and walked towards my yard and straight to my house where they stood  it against the wall. One of the men ascended the ladder to the roof and disconnected power from there.
The cheering and laughing at this drama had brought was ear -deafening and I was really non-plussed. Why was this happening to me?
NCC evicting me and ZESCO disconnecting me on the same day and almost at the same time!
As I have said, we had  a newly born baby and it was unthinkable it could withstand the cold outside the house. Was this some kind of bad omen?
The English say, it never rains, but it pours. When all this was happening, I was as poor as the proverbial church mouse. I had neither the money nor anyone I could think of to urgently come to my rescue from this quagmire.
What was I to do? The time was 08.30 hours now and I was sweating everywhere. I had to find a way out of this predicament. Necessity is the mother of invention and, suddenly, it occurred to me that I could get an advance from my work place.
But when you filled in the advance forms, it wasn’t automatic that you would be given the money on the spot. It took a week or more. So close and yet so far!
Where would I be staying with my family? I urgently needed the money especially to pay to the council within 24 hours before the house would be given to someone else (the type of  house I was living in was in demand at that time and those evicted and failed to clear the arrears within 24 hours lost them).
With electricity, this was not a big hustle. We could use charcoal for cooking and candles for lighting.
So, I got to my place of work and straight to the personnel manager. He gave me the forms which I quickly signed.
“Sir, the problem I have is a big one and I need this money now,” I pleaded with  the personnel manager, in the hope he would empathize with me.
He looked at me and said “Potipher, there is a process in these things. You can’t just fill in the forms now and expect to be given the money just now.”
I was really in a sink-or-swim situation. Swimming was not an option for me; something needed to be done. Come what may!
Though embarrassing my case was, I decided to let the cat out of the bag about the magnitude of my problem and why it was imperative for me to have the money urgently.
“My wife gave birth last week and the council has locked my house for being in two months arrears,” I found myself saying. “ZESCO have also disconnected me. Sir, we can’t stay out in the cold with a newly born baby,” I pleaded.
The personnel manager looked me straight into the eyes, perhaps to see whether what I was telling him was the truth.
“I am sorry. Is that what has happened? Too bad,” he said without betraying any emotion.
For the sake of the baby, however,  he wrote me a piece of paper which he asked me to take to the accounts department.
At the accounts, I approached the man who was acting chief accountant instead of the accounts clerk. Call it strategy! I explained my predicament before I gave him the piece of paper from the personnel manager.
The acting chief accountant was quite understanding. Instead of writing me a cheque, he signed a petty cash voucher which I took to the accounts clerk and in no time, (you guessed it) I was given cash!
From the accounts department, I went straight to my office and explained my problem to my supervisor who was so considerate and gave me a day off to sort  out my predicament.
I then rushed to ZESCO, which was not far from my work place, paid the bill and pleaded that the power be restored in good time. I had a number of friends there and I was assured that everything would be okay. Remember, there was quick response then.
From ZESCO, I rushed to the Civic Centre where I also had friends  whom I talked to. They gave me a note which I took to one of the housing officers and I went to the counter and cleared the arrears and paid one month in advance, to the good.
Before 12.00 hours, the council had unlocked my house and by 13.00 hours, ZESCO had reconnected power to my lost-but-found property!
With a bit of change from the advance, I decided to go and have a beer at one of the bars near home in celebration of this unlikely feat. By 20.00 hours, I had taken one too many and when I got home, there was nothing on my mind but vengeance. I shouted at the neighbours, especially the woman who wanted to see what kind of beds and sofas those who were evicted had.
A week after this happened to me, in a twist of fate, the family of the female neighbour who was laughing at us had their electricity disconnected from the pole and three days later, their house was locked by the council eviction squad and they stayed out in the cold for a night before they could find money to pay for the arrears while I lost count of how many days they slept in the dark.
One thing I appreciate  Zambia’s second Republican president the late Dr Fredrick Chiluba  for, is that, he made it possible for many Zambians to own houses which he directed they be sold to sitting tenants at giveaway prices.
Without him, embarrassing evictions would have continued and many people would have lost their houses. May his soul rest in peace.
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