By Edwin Mbulo
LIFE for Agness Anastasia Shaba Keele is thrilling.
LIFE for Agness Anastasia Shaba Keele is thrilling.
The 61-year-old widow wakes up early every day knowing that she has to contribute to assisting people in distress in Mukuni Village thanks to her selling Airtel scratch cards.
Keele however, says despite not making as much profit as she would like to, she has not abandoned selling talk-time as it gives her a thrill to help serve her community whose health centre does not operate 24 hours.
Keele has named her shop 'Shabashaba Shop number 18' after her late husband Linus Shaba. The shop is situated a few metres from chief Mukuni's Lumpasa palace.
She says she started selling scratch cards during the time of Zain as Mukuni village - situated in Kazungula district - only started receiving mobile cell phone signals at that time.
"I get some problems in the evenings when some people come…, but due to my own safety concerns I only open to sell the cards after one has convincingly identified his or herself by name.
Many of those who come say that they have a bereavement, or a relative is sick and they need to call for assistance," Keele says.
Born in 1952 in Mukuni Village, Keele says she buys K760 worth of scratch cards on a weekly basis, but is sad that profit margins are meagre.
Keele is occasionally assisted in the interview by her grandchild who says she was in grade three when her grandmother started to sell talk-time.
"I give them K760 per week and I only get K40 meaning K740 is theirs. Many have stopped but I have vowed not to stop. I won't because I have developed a customer base and people come here because they know that they will find talk-time at anytime, that is why I have continued," she says.
She says selling talk-time also has an advantage to her shop as customers who go to buy airtime also buy other merchandise such as cooking oil, candles and foodstuffs.
Keele appeals to Airtel to aggressively sensitise rural areas of Zambia on the various services it provides such as 'The More Money' and 'Airtel Win Big.' "
I started when it was still Zain, Celtel, then Airtel. Bali mukuchinja, bachinja zi post, bazibweza, batupa eezi, kambo kwali cha green, bazi bweeza, kwali za triangle, batuletela ezi. (They keep on changing; they changed the advert posts, they gave us green ones, there were triangular ones, they got them and brought these)," Keele says, pointing at Airtel mobile network advert metal banner. Listening to her discuss the contributions and the numerous lives she may have helped save by selling talk-time scratch cards well after her business hours, Keele is clearly unaware of how Bharti Airtel bought Zain shares from Zain Zambia Plc in 2010.
And apart from the vivid changes of the marketing billboards from what she describes as green for Zain to Airtel's present trademark red and the construction of network towers, Keele is also nowhere near knowing how wealthy businessman Bharti Mittal completed the US $10.7 billion acquisition of Kuwait-based Zain's African franchise except for Sudan and Morocco.
Keele says she started selling talk-time scratch cards when her shop was just being completed from a makeshift store.
"When I finished building my shop, talk-time started, sometime after 2005, there were no towers," she says in Toka-Leya.
Keele says she normally faces problems as customers usually get upset when they find scratch cards are not available.
"Customers want to always find talk-time cards, but those who bring only bring the cards on Monday and Thursdays. If I run out of talk-time it is a problem for me to send my grandchildren to town," she says.
Keele says she used to live in Lusaka's Chelston area before she relocated to Mukuni village with her husband Shaba.
"My husband died here in Mukuni village in 1993. I had six children, but I lost one and I have remained with one son and four daughters," she says.
Keele says she has twelve grandchildren and a great-grandchild.
SOURCE :THE POST NEWSPAPER
She says selling talk-time also has an advantage to her shop as customers who go to buy airtime also buy other merchandise such as cooking oil, candles and foodstuffs.
Keele appeals to Airtel to aggressively sensitise rural areas of Zambia on the various services it provides such as 'The More Money' and 'Airtel Win Big.' "
I started when it was still Zain, Celtel, then Airtel. Bali mukuchinja, bachinja zi post, bazibweza, batupa eezi, kambo kwali cha green, bazi bweeza, kwali za triangle, batuletela ezi. (They keep on changing; they changed the advert posts, they gave us green ones, there were triangular ones, they got them and brought these)," Keele says, pointing at Airtel mobile network advert metal banner. Listening to her discuss the contributions and the numerous lives she may have helped save by selling talk-time scratch cards well after her business hours, Keele is clearly unaware of how Bharti Airtel bought Zain shares from Zain Zambia Plc in 2010.
And apart from the vivid changes of the marketing billboards from what she describes as green for Zain to Airtel's present trademark red and the construction of network towers, Keele is also nowhere near knowing how wealthy businessman Bharti Mittal completed the US $10.7 billion acquisition of Kuwait-based Zain's African franchise except for Sudan and Morocco.
Keele says she started selling talk-time scratch cards when her shop was just being completed from a makeshift store.
"When I finished building my shop, talk-time started, sometime after 2005, there were no towers," she says in Toka-Leya.
Keele says she normally faces problems as customers usually get upset when they find scratch cards are not available.
"Customers want to always find talk-time cards, but those who bring only bring the cards on Monday and Thursdays. If I run out of talk-time it is a problem for me to send my grandchildren to town," she says.
Keele says she used to live in Lusaka's Chelston area before she relocated to Mukuni village with her husband Shaba.
"My husband died here in Mukuni village in 1993. I had six children, but I lost one and I have remained with one son and four daughters," she says.
Keele says she has twelve grandchildren and a great-grandchild.
SOURCE :THE POST NEWSPAPER
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