By Chernor Alimamy Kamara
The Bo City Council is pressing on with an operation to clear street traders from the Central Business District of the City.
The Communication Officer of the Council told Politico that the ongoing operation has the support of stakeholders including executive members of the Sierra Leone Traders Union, Civil Society Organizations, the Sierra Leone Police, the Republic of Sierra Leone Armed Forces, and the Road Safety Corps.
Mac’Ivan Kakpindi Vandy said the decongestion of the CBD ought to have started in August but the executive of the traders union appealed for the operation to be pushed back to September which the Council respected so that the union could inform and educate their members occupying the streets of the CBD.
Vandy stated that in a meeting summoned by the Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) Southern Region, Brima Kanneh on the 12th of September, 2023 at the Regional Police Headquarters in Bo, all stakeholders present at the meeting resolved the necessity of decongesting the CBD. He said: “Everybody is building shacks along the streets and that has not gone down well with not just the Council but even a good number of residents of the city. They've been complaining to the Council to take some bold steps to address the matter”.
The Bo City Council Communications officer said the Council has provided 80 stores for the traders where registration has already begun and that they are also pushing towards more alternatives.
The Bo District Chairman of the Sierra Leone Traders Union told Politico that his union was not happy with the operation because it’s adversely affecting their members but he said they have asked them to cooperate and be law-abiding.
Obai Kamara said they were never told about the 80 stores the Council claims to have provided and expressed frustration that as a body in charge of the traders, they should be involved in whatever decision is taken on their behalf.
Chairman Kamara said the Traders Union should be involved in identifying the stores to see if they were fit for purpose and appealed to the Council to move their traders beyond the gutters instead of totally removing them from the streets.
Mustapha Kpaka Jr. Regional Convener for Civil Society Organizations told Politico that inasmuch as the traders Union was part of the Civil Society body; they should abide by the regulations that prohibit street trading.
He stated the Council should think of the economic situation in the country before embarking on such operations, saying they should have encouraged the traders to push beyond the gutters as was done at Abacha Street in Freetown.
Copyright © 2023 Politico (29/09/23)
