The taxi driver with a big heart

Dar es Salaam. From the dirty, overloaded, rattling daladala and the tiny, slow-moving bajaj to the dangerous bodaboda, the three main options available for users of public transport in the city rarely leave anyone with any form of joy. Worse still, the men (and women) behind the wheels, their conductors too, have earned themselves the notoriety of making a ride a moving hell for commuters.

So, the adrenaline driven drivers, conductors and hyperactive bodaboda riders, have generally been lumped together as offsprings of one parent.

They are commonly labelled verbally abusive, carefree and in most cases a petty thieving unreliable bunch.

Granted, there are perennially serious trust issues between commuters and those whose job is to carry them from point A to point B.

Cases of passengers losing their valuables on daladalas, in bajajis and taxis in Dar es Salaam are widespread. Whether it’s stolen or one forgets their parcel, it is only by sheer luck in this part of the world for a passenger to recover anything lost or left in a taxi, or on the mostly overloaded commuter bus.

This is why a story like that of Jonathan Goodluck Mzava is one that’s hard to believe -- yet also one with a moral lesson about Tanzanians who refuse to be labelled -- who refuse to adopt the colour of their surroundings, but instead chose to work on turning the lights on, where there is darkness.

He is a bajaj taxi driver -- Mr Mzava -- who may remain in the memories of one his passengers for years to come because of a single act of honest and selflessness on a fateful February morning, this year.

It started as a normal day for the 31-year-old bajaji driver. In the wee hours, the father of one woke up and propelled his three-wheeler towards his workstation.

At exactly 6am, he was already parked at the Shoppers Plaza in Msasani, his base.

After some early morning rounds, he received a call from one of his regular passengers at around midday.

“After I dropped my passenger around 1pm, I got others… two of them were students at an international school in Masaki, then I got another one… and two more .”

It turned out to be an abnormally busy afternoon for him -- little did he know that a major test of honesty and trustworthiness will come with the prospect of having a fat pocket at the end of it all.

He recalls: “On my way back to Shoppers Plaza, I noticed that there was a parcel on the passenger seat. One thing I knew for sure was that it wasn’t mine. I opened it and found a laptop.”

Thoughts raced through his mind as he tried to figure out whose valuable asset it was.

“If felt sorry for whoever might have left that because I knew the laptop could be containing valuable, and work documents. I also knew that he or she probably thought it was gone for good,” he says.

Then came the biggest hurdle -- despite his good intentions to return the laptop, how was he going to do it? It was going to be a long shot.

A good starting point, however, was calling his regular passenger, the one he had ferried in the morning, just in case. He did exactly that.

“I asked her about it and she said it wasn’t hers.”

Back at the Shoppers Plaza pick-up point, Mr Mzava also asked his colleagues if they had heard anyone looking for lost property, and the answer was no. He told them in case anyone showed up he or she should be directed to him.

Efforts to find the owner on that day hit a brick wall.

Two days later, on February 24, the regular passenger called and requested to meet him, to consider how they could trace the laptop owner.

She advised him to post a lost and found announcement on social media. They settled for the famous Team Tanzania Facebook page.

“I don’t know what she wrote in the message, but in a space of a few hours she called telling me that the owner has been found,” says Mr Mzava.

The two contacted the owner and arranged a meeting with her, and after successfully providing basic information about her lost laptop they handed it back to her.

“I can’t thank him enough; I just pray for him to continue like this. I am honestly happy about his gesture of kindness. I did not expect that there are still people with such a big heart in this hectic city,” says the laptop owner, who for reasons The Citizen On Saturday couldn’t establish, preferred anonymity.

Facebook hit

The story also became a hit on the Team Tanzania facebook page with members commenting in amazement on the taxi driver’s honesty.

“Not all Heroes wear Caps! May Allah Bless the Bajaji guy,” one member of the group noted.

Another member wrote: “Goodluck (Mr Mzava’s middle name) has an appropriate name - he brings good luck to his passengers. Maybe it is time for him to reap what he sows - goodness.”

Some asked for Mr Mzava’s contacts, while others suggested he be considered for the ‘Good Citizen of the Year Award’.

Well, these awards are not officially known to held in any Tanzanian city or town.

But in other countries, they are given to people who make a difference in their communities.

The awards reward and recognise individuals and organisations that have made a noteworthy contribution during the current year, and/or given an outstanding service over a number of years, to a local community over and above normal employment duties.

Mr Mzava’s regular passenger, the one who helped trace the laptop owner, had this to say: “When he asked me if I had left my laptop in his bajaj, I noticed that he was really concerned and worried.

I decided to help me when I found out that he was till looking for the owner two days later.”

“Mzava is a good guy and kind guy; I did not want him to be troubled over a laptop he was trying to return. I wasn’t expecting such immediate results, but to my surprise in just two hours the owner had already been alerted, and had tried to contact me.”

Lesson learnt

For Mr Mzava, the incident is a big lesson.

“When I saw the joy on the face of the lady who had lost the laptop, I also saw the deep sadness, what pain it would have caused her had she not found it back,” he recalls.

“She told me that I had made her happy again; this was very important to me. Making someone happy is no small feat…I didn’t know that the bag contained some important documents, and the laptop also had important files.”

Mr Mzava is happy that he and his colleagues at the Shoppers Plaza bajaj station have earned themselves a reputation for trustworthiness.

He recalls that in 2014, a similar incident occurred, when a boy forgot his phone in a bajaj there, and got it back after 21 days. His message to fellow taxi drivers: “I honestly wish the rest of us could be this way, always.”