afrol News / The Chronicle, 10 April - As days draw closer to 15 April, the deadline for street vendors in the country to move to designated flea markets, vendors in Malawi's capital Lilongwe say they are not relocating to Tsoka Flea Market, vowing to stay put at their respective business places.

Speaking in an interview with 'The Chronicle', the Chairman for Lilongwe Street Vendors Association, Grant Phiri, stressed that the vendors are not shaken and neither are they going any where under whatever circumstances.

"We are not shaken and we are not moving out. We hope to come to the negotiation table with the City Assembly before the deadline and we still hope to come up with a solution," Phiri said.

Phiri's remarks, however, are contrary to what the Lilongwe City Assembly's Administrative Officer, Paul Malunga, said in an interview that there has been a tremendous response from the vendors and that the Assembly had registered 5000 vendors.

"We have had a very good response and we were forced to close on Friday, March 31, 2006, after we had registered five thousand vendors," Malunga said, adding, "the problem is that the vendors are misleading each other. Some are in the forefront encouraging their friends not to go and register while they sneak and register themselves," he said.

Malunga added that the operation of clearing the vendors from the streets would be very systematic and he stressed that nothing would stop the Assembly and government from carrying out the operation.

"Believe me, the contingent put in place by the government and the Assembly to undertake the operation is competitive and with the strategies we have put in place, we do not expect any fracas during the operation," the officer said.

The vendors association chairman, however, expressed ignorance on the registration of the 5000 vendors and said if some had indeed, they were not street vendors because he said the real ones would not have done that without his knowledge.

"I am hearing it from you that some have registered. But even if they said 10,000 have registered, it wouldn't mean anything to us because they are mere vendors and not street vendors," he said, adding, "to identify real street vendors the Assembly could have liaised with the association and have a list of the actual vendors."

The Association's publicity secretary, Edward Time, concurred with his chairperson saying the Assembly's task in registering the said vendors was vain.

"The whole task the Assembly has undertaken in registering the said vendors is vain. What criteria did they use to establish whether the vendors were real street vendors or not. It is only through our Association that real vendors could be identified," said Time.

On whether the vendors had engaged a lawyer to pursue their case with the Assembly as per recent media reports, the Lilongwe Street Vendors Association Chairman said the lawyer they had engaged was there to merely assist the Association on legal matters.

"You know the Association has become of age now and just like any other association or organisation we have a lawyer who provide us with legal advise on several things including how best to run the association," Phiri said.

Meanwhile the vendors are organising to have interdenominational prayers on a day yet to be announced to ask for God's intervention. The prayers, Phiri said, would be held in Zomba, Blantyre, Limbe, Lilongwe and in several other places.

Commenting on whether the shunned Tsoka Flea Market Park would accommodate the 5000 registered vendors, Lilongwe City Assembly's Administration office said some of the vendors would be allocated to township markets in areas of 13, 25, 23, Kawale, Kanengo and many more. Meanwhile, the Assembly has cleared the land behind the market in a bid to accommodate more vendors.

By Kondwani Magombo

© afrol News / The Chronicle

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