The Mayor and City Council (M&CC) will be moving to regularise vending along Robb Street, Georgetown following complaints of wholesalers that those vendors are affecting retailers in the Bourda Market.
On Tuesday, Mayor Patricia Chase Green confirmed that the Council has ordered the Clerk of Market to have the area regularised.
Wholesale vendors along Robb Street, Georgetown
“I would have raised that issue, because on my visit there on Saturday, I have received complaints from the retail vendors that the wholesalers are no longer occupying the Merriman Mall, that area that we would have provided for them with a shelter, but they come out actually all day and wholesalers are not allowed to sell all day,” Chase Green told Guyana Times.
The Mayor added that the wholesalers were supposed to be vending between the hours of 17:00h and 06:00h. However, this is not so according to the stallholders who informed that the wholesalers were vending all day and night and were retailing at wholesale prices.
“The Clerk of Markets, along with the City Constabulary, is expected to go and to regularise that area once again and [ensure] that the wholesalers return to their place,” she informed.
Stallholders from inside the Bourda Market are further alleging that wholesalers from Parika and other areas are setting up stalls along Robb Street and retailing goods at wholesale prices to customers.
“The wholesalers outside on Robb Street are selling the goods, the same goods we buy from them at the wholesale price and this is affecting us and customers are not coming into the market,” stallholder Himwattie Barry said.
Barry added that vendors were finding it hard to pay their stall rental fees since they were subjected to unfair competition. She noted that they had brought the issue to the attention of the Market Clerk, who promised to have the issue addressed since Friday last.
The vegetable vendor noted that she incurred losses on a daily basis, since customers were not coming into the Market to shop. “These are perishable goods I have here, and we have to be dumping it and we are the ones who are feeling the pressure,” she complained.
Collectively, the stallholders inside the Market reiterated Barry’s concerns and noted that very little action was being taken by the City Council.
When this publication visited the Robb Street area, the wholesalers informed that they were plying a legal trade since they make payments, ranging from $500 to $1000, to the City Constables every three hours.
When asked about this, Chase Green said, “It is not the responsibility of the Constable to collect revenue…revenue clerks are assigned by the Clerk of Market and they are the only persons who are to be paid and the vendors are expected to ensure that they receive a receipt for the money they are paying.”
She added that the vendors were not supposed to pay a charge every three hours, rather they paid a onetime charge for the duration of their vending time, which is between the hours of 17:00h and 06:00h.
However, the Robb Street vendors complained that they were forced to sell beyond their allotted time, since their produce was not sold out and they would be the ones to incur a loss if they did not continue vending.
