The Jinja City Spokesperson, Rajab Kitto says that the operation was sanctioned early this week due to unregulated businesses that have been set up in the city.
Jinja City
authorities have intensified operations to evict roadside vendors, illegal taxis, and boda boda stages in a bid to restore trade order in the city.
The Jinja
City Spokesperson, Rajab Kitto says that the operation was sanctioned early this
week due to unregulated businesses that have been set up in the city.
Kitto argues
that, in some circumstances, roadside vendors are cheaply selling items, while
the shop owners have been denied access to their targeted clients, yet they are
expected to remit both monthly and annual taxes to the Jinja city council.
“Shop owners
are reluctant towards paying trading licenses, due to economic pressures hinged
on their business enterprises by vendors, who display items cheaply along the
roadsides and in areas where we had zoned off to collect about 100 Million
Shillings, we hardly get 20 Million Shillings, which has overtime affected our
revenue collection targets,” he says.
Kitto
further says that illegal taxis and boda boda stages are contributing to traffic
congestion in the city. Kitto adds that they will continue relying on city
enforcement teams, police, and UPDF to restore order in the central business
district.
//Cue in:
“For quite some time…
Cue out…and the UPDF,”.
Safiat Nakiranda, the coordinator of hawkers tasked Jinja City authorities to
map out designated areas for evening markets, where traders can easily sell merchandise,
rather than pushing them off the streets without creating for them alternative
avenues of earning income.
Nakiranda
argues that there are over 500 registered roadside vendors dealing in
different items ranging from food to textile products. She adds that setting up
an open working space will enable them to keep afloat, as they move off the
streets.
