Durban author demystifies what happens in customs
LOVE or the law. That’s the choice a customs official has to make in The Customs Man, a gritty debut novel by Durban author Zain Aboobaker.
In the book he exposes the dark underbelly of customs’ enforcement and organised crime in South Africa, revealing layers of intrigue which are usually hidden from the public eye.
The book starts in Durban harbour but then takes readers across the country as the story picks up pace, shining a light on issues usually whispered about in dark corridors.
It tells the story of a customs official, the choices he faces every day, and his inner conflicts like whether he should protect those he loves or stick to his morals and let the law take its course. Lovers of crime and suspense are in for a treat as corruption, betrayal, smuggling and even South Africa’s ailing clothing industry is featured in the book.
It’s clear that Aboobaker is familiar with the goings on in customs after spending nearly two decades on the inside before starting up his own consultancy.
“So it's about 17 years on the inside and then 17 years on the outside. It's nice to have had both views. You know, when you work inside customs, you see one side of things and you look at the law in a certain way. When you step outside it's like looking at it from the other end of the telescope,” he revealed earlier this week.
Aboobaker told the Independent on Saturday that his career gave him the opportunity to observe people and human nature which served him well when he took up writing.
“When people are normally in a bind, when the goods are seized or they've been detained, they start to really get stressed and anxious and, they're pleading and they'll move heaven and earth. As soon as they have relief, you see a different human being come out of them. They forget the pain that they were in and some of them begin to get arrogant again.”
As a child he loved reading and just over ten years ago he looked back on his life and remembered all the colourful characters he had met along the way.
“So, it was actually just taking the characters that I met and sort of fictionalizing them and then it just got a life of its own and it morphed,” he said.
He wrote the first chapter in 2013 and then left it there until his wife Katherine and best friend Quintas van der Merwe convinced him to continue in 2022.
“My wife says to everybody, ‘oh, Zane's writing a book’ and so the pressure starts,” he said.
Aboobaker met Van der Merwe when he was working in Customs as head of its national Anti-Smuggling Division.
In the foreword of the book Van der Merwe who is a lawyer wrote that, “The author and I met working on opposite ends - he tried to catch non-compliant taxpayers, and I tried to get them off.”
Despite the rocky start they have been firm friends for many years.
The book is filled with familiar places and relatable characters. It tells the story of Charlotte the doctor who suffers from white guilt and wants to help the community. She passes on diamonds to Georgie the son of a fisherman who is forced to smuggle abalone after overfishing destroys his family’s livelihood. Georgie’s role is to get the diamonds out of the country.
There’s a Zimbabwean electrical engineer who smuggles cigarettes across the border and whose sister was killed during Xenophobia attacks in South Africa.
“It's a light read but there are heavy themes in it that I hope will spark debate,” said Aboobaker. The Customs Man is available in paperback and retails for R290 on Amazon and Ike’s Bookshop in Morningside.