via Chombo declares Murambatsvina on vendors – The Zimbabwean 4 February 2015 by Jera
Minister of Local Government Ignatius Chombo is up to his usual anti-people shenanigans.
“The upsurge of indiscriminate vending in urban areas has acutely affected the ambience of our environs while compromising the health of residents. All local authorities are therefore required to immediately take necessary measures to remove the vendors from undesignated sites to alternative planned vending points,” said Chombo.
This speech would have made sense in 1985 when unemployment was virtually zero and all the designated vending stations could accommodate the population of hawkers. But given the current 90% unemployment the population of street vendors has swelled enormously.
It is pointless for municipal police to spend valuable time chasing hawkers because practically all our youths are on the streets vending. As long as the millions of unemployed youths are selling airtime and bananas, we can at least tell ourselves that they are ‘self-employed’ (euphemism for ‘jobless under Mugabe’). But once barred from carrying out the only available enterprise, Zimbabwe would certainly face civil unrest. Chombo and his comrades in Zanu (PF) will do well to remember the old adage; an idle mind is the devil’s workshop. There is a second proverb; a hungry man is an angry man.
The minister of finance has acknowledged the importance of the informal sector. A vending tax has recently been introduced. There are about 500,000 people in formal jobs. This small group cannot bankroll government projects. As it is, government struggles to meet its obligations. Civil service wages are being paid from loans – a situation which is not sustainable.
COMMENTS
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I support Chombo in this move. There are designated areas and the number of vendors needs to be regulated.
Afterall there is only a set amount of money circulating and this cannot be shared on an viable level with an infinite amount of people otherwise we will end up with each person selling only to their own family.
Furthermore the traders with shops in the city who pay rates, shop licenses , salaries,and taxes are slowly being strangled and brought under by the indiscriminent take over by non licensed vendors in the CBD. They also have families to feed as do their employees and as does the tax and rates money.
The need is to create more jobs rather than destroy the few that that have managed to survive.
The alternative is to turn into a city of mud roads, creaters and no or very little needed facilities like Goma or Kisangani.