Drama has erupted in Bulawayo after women at the heart of the city were found stripping naked in the men’s public toilet(PICTURED).
This came as an embarrassing video circulated on social networks of a man caught masturbating less than 50 metres from the area where women are using the same toilet. The identity of the man in the video could not be ascertained at the time of writing.
Bulawayo’s female vendors and their clients are at a high risk of getting raped or sexually abused as their toilets are locked by the BCC, thereby forcing them to share the toilets with their male counterparts.
In a harrowing revelation by informal traders during the launch of a massive cleaning exercise around the Lobengula street mall that includes the Bulawayo main commuter omnibus rank, yesterday, ladies are sharing toilets with men.
Zimeye.com captured a desperate woman waiting at the closed and locked female toilet, intending to get her chance to go into the gents’ latrine.
“We are appealing to the city council to open ladies toilets which have been closed several months ago for reasons not known to us. We have been risking sexual abuse and possible rape by strangers, as we will be relieving ourselves inside the men’s toilets. Please city council, do something and I hope you are listening. This was going to be instantly answered had it been that the Mayor who we invited for this function was here,” said Mrs Marvis Thabo, a vendor at Lobengula Street Mall.
Her sentiments were supported by Albert Sibanda, the Chief Executive Officer for the National Commuter transport Association Trust. “We have been pleading with the city fathers to have mercy on these mothers who may be vulnerable to sex starved men. They can be raped or robbed while helping themselves from gents’ toilets. Why can’t the Council do something and open the ladies’ toilets so that they can relieve themselves in relevant latrines?” asked Sibanda.
Several women who spoke to ZimEye.com expressed their disgruntlement for the Bulawayo city Council’s actions against the innocent community who are also ratepayers for the local authority.
“We are going to take action if these toilets are not opened this week. It is our right to have public female toilets open to serve us. We have since approached the Women Lawyers Association to look into our predicament,” they complained.

Asked to comment on the closure of women toilets at the mall, Bulawayo City Council promised to come back with a comment, but that had not been done at the time of going to press.