Dear Editor,
WE wish to bring to the attention of relevant authorities the abuse contracted drivers are going through at Lafarge Cement Zambia.
Drivers are being persecuted through cameras on the high ways where the company has engaged some people who take pictures of drivers whenever they stop on the highway even just to buy a bag of charcoal. When one is pictured as having stopped to either buy something or even give money to a relative, they are photographed and the picture displayed in the plant and that driver is either blacklisted or suspended from entering the plant.
Already two drivers who were pictured giving money to family members have been banned while another one was banned this week.
Besides this when trucks are packed in their plant awaiting loading drivers are not allowed to knock off and yet they are expected to enter the plant before 18:00 hours even when the firm knows they will not load that same day.
Truck drivers move with their wives in some countries, but at Lafarge one cannot even allow a truck driver’s wife into a stationary truck.
Lafarge products are not inflammable or radioactive and yet they insist that drivers must stay within the company premises even when they are not loading. Now we hear that they want to put cameras in cabins of trucks.
Lafarge is also the only cement plant in southern Africa without showers and cooking facilities and yet they force drivers not to knock off but to spend days without cooking and bathing.
Lafarge also forces drivers to put on their personal protective clothing from outside exposing them to being seen by members of the public as they change attire and yet their members of staff come with their own clothes and change from their offices.
Then drivers are also not allowed to carry lorry mates meaning that the driver has to find money to pay off loaders when they reach their destination or do it alone!
Lafarge also lacks a policy to cater for the disabled because we know of Mr Mazila and Mr Mwanza from Agrofuels and A M Motors, respectively, who were banned from entering the plant on account of their disabilities.
A driver cannot even give a ride to a workmate otherwise the driver risks facing sanctions.
We are asking this listening government to come to our aid and rescue us from this colonial era type of treatment.
DISAPPOINTED and ANGRY CONTRACTED DRIVERS