Africa-Press – Namibia. SHE grabs her merchandise and runs away when she sees a group of young men wearing navy blue uniforms heading towards her.
Helmi Joel (47), a street vendor at Okahao, has been selling her goods on the streets of the town for as long as she can remember. She says guards often beat her and her colleagues when they catch them selling their products.
Her journey to town is a walk of more than 10km every day, with her only refuge from the scorching sun her big blue-and-yellow umbrella. Joel says one morning in October, while offloading her merchandise from a vehicle, about 20 security guards surrounded and handcuffed her.
While handcuffed, the guards started assaulting her with their hard knobbies before dragging her by her arms and legs to their vehicle, she says. She says some of them even loaded a box of her sweet potatoes and other things into their truck.
“I screamed they were hurting my foot. They did not listen . . . They continued whipping me. My foot and hands were swollen,” she says.
Joel says the guards also took her wallet with more than N$300. Her bread-and-butter money. And no, she did not report this to the police. She didn’t go to hospital either.
Life must carry on. As usual, ‘scorpion’ and ?’anaconda’ ointment relieved her pain. Joel says the town council does not like vendors on the streets. “They want us to go and sell at a makeshift open market, but there are no customers there.”
Joel’s colleague, Magadalena Mbwalala, says some of their colleagues have even been arrested in the past and have had to spend the night at the Okahao Police Station. Life as a vendor is not for the faint-hearted.
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