Army best placed to restore sanity to Comesa Market
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Following one of the worst cholera outbreaks in Zambia’s history, Government in February last year was compelled to introduce Statutory Instrument number 10 of 2018 which strengthens laws against trading in undesignated places and public nuisances. The Zambia Army was then unleashed on the streets of Lusaka to enforce this particular SI and stamp out street vending and other illegal activities.
But a few months later, illegal trading returned to Comesa Market with a vengeance. A cartel of politically-connected foreign nationals led by a Ugandan national called Farook Mwale descended on this part of the city and begun constructing permanent steel structures (as can be seen on the pictures) on gazetted roads and other public installations, while also encroaching on private land.
The cartel proceeded to allocate these illegal structures as trading spaces at – exorbitant prices – to traders who are mostly foreign nationals.
For months, this cartel has thwarted numerous attempts by the Lusaka City Council to move in and put a stop to their illegal activities, using a combination of scare tactics (they claim to have connections to State House) and corruption.
According to information collected from the traders, for one to buy trading space at Comesa they need to pay K25,000 for a 3 by 4 meters piece of land – on a gazetted road.
It doesn’t end there though.
The last month alone, the cartel disguised as a market committee, has levied K300 on each of the more than 200 traders, supposedly for grading the road, and K250 as surveyor’s fee. Surveyor’s fee on a gazetted road!
One is then compelled to ask, where does all this money go?
Well, this writer has established that some of the money has been used to bribe Lusaka City Council officials and some influential politicians (they will be named soon) to ensure that the local authority continues to fail to enforce its own laws.
As if that is not enough, it has been discovered that these illegal structures have been electrified. Which raises the questions, who connected power to these structures? Do the traders buy ZESCO units or are they billed? Do they have metre numbers? Or are the legitimate business owners in the area bearing the cost of this illegality?
Something is seriously wrong here. ZESCO must surely take a keen interest in this matter. Besides the threat of cholera due to flooding and a lack of proper sanitation facilities in the area, there is now a genuine threat of a fire that may be caused by these illegal connections. Now, in the event that a fire does occur, how are the fire engines going to access the area since the roads have been encroached on?
To the Anti-corruption Commission, this is one case that would be easy to solve and prosecute. All they need to do is go on the ground and ask the traders who allocated them shops on a gazetted road, who collects levies from them and whether they are issued receipts.
With the Lusaka City Council clearly failing in its mandate, perhaps it is time to send in the Zambia Army once again to deal with the lawlessness at Comesa Market once and for all.
This writer also appeals to the Ministry of Local Government to invoke to invoke section 88 of the Local Government Act Cap 281 of the Laws of Zambia and suspend the Lusaka City Council to pave way for investigations into reports of rampant corruption at Civic Center, starting with the man at the top, the town clerk. As the local authority in the nation’s capital, Lusaka City Council has failed to lead by example not only in service delivery but also in enforcing its own laws.
Perhaps Its time the Lusaka city council town clerk was transferred having been at the helm since April, 2014 replacing Mr. Moses Mwelwa