On 20th September 2015, I left Harare, set for my exploratory visit to Limpopo and armed with a set of copies of a structured questionnaire that I intended to pre-test. I chose to use public transport – I travelled by bus from Harare to Musina – a distance of about 8 hours, then took a commuter omnibus from Musina to Vivo, where Collen would collect me. Vivo is a small town in the Blouberg Local Municipality and it lies south of the Brak River, in a gap between the Soutpansberg and the Blouberg Range, along the M521 highway which connects Musina town and Polokwane18. We were 12 passengers on the commuter omnibus (9 men and 3 women), and all the way, the driver of the commuter omnibus, which left Musina at about 7pm was playing Zimbabwean music, which to me was an indication that most of his clients are Zimbabweans. I had a brief chat with a girl (I estimated her age to be between 17 and 19 year) sitting next to me. She told me that she is from Masvingo (Southern Zimbabwe) and she came to South Africa in 2013 after finishing secondary school (Form 4). She followed her mother who came to work in South Africa around 2002. Her mother lives and works on a horticultural farm just about 50Km from Musina, along the N1 highway. When the girl came to South Africa, she worked as a casual labourer on the farm for 3 months before she got another job in a Chinese retail shop in Musina town. She stays with her mother on the farm, and commutes to work daily, except on Sundays.
I also followed a discussion involving three men sitting in front of me. From their accents, I could tell that they come from Chipinge (South Eastern Zimbabwe). They had had spent almost three hours at the border negotiating their entry into South Africa since they did not have passports. They were allowed in after bribing immigration officers manning the entrance
18 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vivo,_Limpopo
points. According to them, they took the evening omnibus to Vivo because, because “there will be no police to harass them again along the way” – and surely we did not see any police check point on the way. I was hesitant to join the discussion, so I could not get the details of how much they paid to the immigration officers. The three men, whom I assumed were not familiar with the area, as much I was not familiar as well, seemed they had already made arrangements with someone who was waiting from them. They kept calling the person as we were travelling, and at one point they gave the phone to the driver so that he could get instructions on where exactly to drop them since it was now dark. They were dropped at the gate of a farm about 30Km before Vivo. About 25 minutes before we got to Vivo, a Zimbabwean man who was occupying a seat just behind me, asked for my cell phone. He wanted to buzz his wife but his own phone had run out of power. After buzzing, the wife called back, and she was instructed to wait for him ‘at the white gate’ because he wanted her to assist with carrying some groceries. After a brief conversation with him, I learnt that the men had gone to Musina to buy some groceries to re-stock a spaza shop that he is running at the farm. As we were approaching Vivo, another man who was talking to a friend said, “I heard of a farm called ‘Z and Z’ which pays very well around this area, and I wish I could work for that farm”. I later learnt that the exact name of the farm is ZZ-2. It is a farming enterprise operating mainly in the Limpopo Province, as well as in the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, Gauteng and Namibia, and it produces a wide range of products including tomatoes, avocadoes, mangoes and apples19. Another man, who was sitting at the back sit, “that’s where I work, come during tomato picking time around June, there will be lot of work”. The two men exchanged cell phone numbers and promised to keep each other updated on opportunities on the farm.
The omnibus setting was useful to me and it later informed the focus of this thesis. From the music that the driver played, through to the discussions which took place while we were on board, I was able to relate that to literature about the extent to which Zimbabwean migrants have moved into the Limpopo province (Addison, 2014; Bolt, 2015; Hall, 2013). In addition, it contributed adjustments that I later effected to my research approach after the exploratory visit. For instance, interview questions aimed at exploring livelihoods diversification techniques and how social networks facilitate mobility of Zimbabwean migrants within the farm labour market were influenced by the stories that I heard during the omnibus ride.
19 http://zz2.biz/
During the two weeks of my exploratory visit, we drove through farms in the Blouberg- Molemole area, visited some farm shops and shopping centers around the farms. We also visited pubs and bottle stores – where Collen told me that this is where Zimbabweans farmworkers come and quench their thirst during the evenings after work and on weekends. At one of the drinking places, I met a group of seven Zimbabwean farm workers (all were men) enjoying Zimbabwean music which was being played by the bar tender. I observed that not even one of them was drinking beer or even a soft drink, some were playing pool, and some were dancing to the music along some South Africa women holding quarts of castle and other brands. The scene helped me to critically think about my research focus and the potential questions that I had to reflect on – what social networks exist between farmworkers and people outside the farms? How are these networks formed? and how important are they to Zimbabwean farmworkers’ access to food and other livelihood opportunities?
I was also introduced to an officer of the South African Police Service (SAPS). He owns a bar in Bochum, a major township in the Capricorn district. He is a very close friend to one of the Zimbabwean teachers who works in the area. The police officer knows Zimbabweans (based in Bochum) who have coordinated the establishment of an association of Zimbabwean farm workers – which assists farm workers during times need, for example when a farmworker is ill or dies. In addition, I observed the long distances that farmworkers had to walk to get to the nearest shopping centers where they could buy food – in some instanced these range from 10Km to 15Km stretches. I had informal interviews with 5 farmworkers, pretesting my questionnaire. Suspicion, and a continual fear of persecution and deportation among the Zimbabwean farmworkers, was noticeable. For instance, after introducing myself and my research, and even after showing him my university registration details, one Zimbabwean farmworker who I met during an inter-farm soccer tournament which was held at Indermark (a township located to the west of Vivo town) refused to talk to me, alleging that I was an undercover official who was disguised as a researcher in order to get his personal details. For those who were willing to engage I could still observe that they were always cautious when responding to questions. This potentially could result in the interviewees concealing crucial details about their personal migration accounts and subsequently compromise the research results. Ryan and Dundon (2008) cautioned that “an initial problem is the existence of suspicion on the part of the interviewees ... The respondent may agree to an interview, but be reluctant to divulge the level and detail of information required. The consequences can be highly problematic and even derail the entire research project” (p. 443). I considered this
statement of caution seriously during the course of my research. The pretesting therefore did not only enable me to identify questions which were a bit sensitive and which the subjects were reluctant to respond to, but it motivated me to change the interview approach all together. Instead of having a semi-structured interview questionnaire, I ended up a ‘mixed data collection approach’ which consisted of structured and informal interviews, direct observations and the use of secondary sources. I will discuss further in this chapter the exact techniques and tools that I used for data collection, In Chapter 5, I will also present a detailed analysis of how the suspicion and continual fear of persecution among Zimbabwean migrant farmworkers is linked to their vulnerability.
I visited a farm compound, which was a bit secluded from the main farm, and had its own entrance separate from the farm’s main gate, and asked a group of women how I could get in touch with the farm manager so that I seek formal permission to get onto the compound and do interviews. I was given the farm Manager’s phone number. I called the farm manager with the intention of setting an appointment with him, but he openly told me that he was not willing to meet with me, and could not allow me entry onto the farm. On another farm, near Indermark, I was greeted by a Zimbabwean supervisor who comes from Bulawayo, Matebeleland. He seemed to have a twin role of being a supervisor and farm guard. His house was secluded from the farm compound – it faced the main entrance of the farm to the west, maybe 100Km from the gate or less, and on the south was what I thought is a warehouse – I saw broken farm machinery and other farm equipment which were piled outside the building. He promised to talk to the farm manager so that I could get permission, but after reminding him for more than 3 times, he still had not talked to the manager. In both cases, I sensed some form of suspicion and hostility – something which had also been observed by previous researchers when they tried to gain entry onto the farms in Limpopo (e.g. Human Rights Watch (2006)). In my initial design of the research, my initial intention was to get onto the farm compounds so that besides interviewing the farmworkers, I could also observe their living and working conditions. The refusal of entry to me became a ‘blessing-in-disguise’. It challenged me to re-formulate the research design so that I could also investigate the politics behind entry onto farm compounds and what that means to the farmworkers. So instead of getting onto the farms, where farmers were reluctant to allow me entry - I resorted to looking for farmworkers in public and social places such as beerhalls, grocery stores and farm shops where they frequent. Direct observation, and participation in an inter-farm soccer tournament which was held in Indermark also enabled by to collect rich data for the thesis. These tournaments are organized by farmers
and they bring together workers from neighbouring farms. However, the inability to get onto the farms also had some negative consequences. I could not speak to farmworkers who, because of their precarity, prefer to stay on the farms.
Overall, the exploratory visit provided me with the following benefits; (a) it inculcated in me an appreciation of the research site – its physical and social context; (b) it abled me to engage with communities relevant to the research, for instance the farmworkers and SAPS officer. According to the CIHR et al. (2014), this process of community engagement allows one to review the research design and adopt appropriate procedures that ensure that cultural norms and the interests of potential participants are respected. Therefore, through the exploratory visit, I identified ethical issues that needed to be considered during the course of the research; (c) it served as a trust building exercise – I introduced myself to some of the farmworkers and other Zimbabwean professionals that I met – we exchanged numbers, and I later followed up with them during data collection phase; and (d) it challenged me to sit back and reflect, and motivated me to re-design the research approach and to develop data collection tools which were relevant to the context.