Vendors occupy soccer field in Zimpeto

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Vendors occupy soccer field in Zimpeto

12:02 CAT | 26 Jun 2020

Photo: O País

The reopening of the Zimpeto wholesale market was scheduled for this Thursday, but this failed happen when rehabilitation works ran over time. As a result, vendors have occupied a local football field. The mayor of Maputo has visited the site and said that the market will reopen today.

The football has no minimum conditions for commercial activity, especially in the context of combating and preventing Covid-19. There is no water for hand washing or public toilets for vendors and customers.

The avalanche of people was so great that the configuration of the football field itself was lost in the crowd buying and selling products.

Shopper Felismina Paulo deplored the condition in which products were being offered, including fast food. “I learned that there was a market here through other people who came here and I followed. But look, there is no sanitary provision, and here we, ready and willing to buy things,” she commented.

Vendors sell off the ground or from trucks. Importers say they are using the space because the wholesale market has not yet reopened.

Francisco Bernardo, selling tomatoes in boxes, was one of those who willing to sell his product there. He told ‘OPaís’ that the situation was complicated because the market remained closed. “They said that the market was reopening today, so we went there early, but found it closed. There was no alternative but to come here,” he said.

Mayor of Maputo Municipality Eneas Comiche visited Zimpeto to update on progress, and promised that the market would reopen to the public this Friday, reiterating the need to reorganise commerce properly during his mandate.

“We cannot allow ruralisation of the city, which is, a capital city. We cannot transform a city into a “dumba-nengue”. No, this has to end. If people still don’t understand this, we have to gradually press home the message [for them] to understand what urban life is about, and how to live in a city – a capital city,” Comiche said.

The mayor said that everything that was being done had been approved by the Municipal Assembly. “We have a programme guiding these activities. We will continue the work because we have the support of the citizens. We have to requalify trade, we have to requalify the city.”

Currently, informal vendors have already been removed from Maputo CBD [Baixa], and the refurbishment of Xipamanine municipal market and the Zimpeto wholesale market is underway.

By Amândio Borges

Source: O País