On Contract Work At A Black Transport Company Poem by Gert Strydom

In City Deep at a black transport company
the managing director temporary shared an office with me
and at nine o'clock he parked his luxury Lexus
walked into the office with a cup of tea

where I was preparing several years of books for an external audit,
where I checked the reconciliation bit by bit
but the very first year I did not touch
was far too scared to get involved with it.

Into the company's premises pulled bus after bus,
where they were washed without any fuss,
where they lined up with hissing brakes
and in silence separately worked the two of us.

Horses and trailers was just bought brand new
and outside was parked some while mechanics serviced a few
but of the vehicles I did not take any notice
while I was hunting for figures that seemed askew.

At eleven a fund collector of the ANC came to collect,
for an amount of fifty thousand Rand the director did not object
it was for a leadership conference held in the north
and few words were said but Mbeki was the subject.

He was out and Jacob Zuma was in
and it seemed that he had done an unpardonable sin
but it did not interest me much
while with a new year's figures I did begin.

With satellite tracking the managing director was following each bus and truck
saw one that was double parked at a shopping mall where it was in traffic stuck,
said aloud: "I do know exactly where every vehicle does go"
and when he slammed his fist down in anger I almost did instinctively duck.

Suddenly outside a big eighteen-wheeler did roar,
came to a halt jackknifing violent and nothing was as before.
The driver rushed into the office, threw some keys over the director's desk
and it was clear that both of them did each other abhor.

Without a further word he walked out after he had dropped the job.

In Johannesburg and Pretoria the busses did run,
some were rented out for weekends of fun,
others were operating in the Northern Cape
while others took communities to enjoy the sea and sun

and drivers conned the wheel
transported passengers in their carriages of steel.