...as peaceful negotiations fail

The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) has warned that its task force is going to apply force to effectively remove hawkers plying their wares at the city centres since peaceful negotiations with them seem to yield no results.

Chronicle also gathered that the hawkers have no right to sell their products on the street pavements since they have not been issued with permits and the practice goes contrary to bye-laws of the assembly.

According to the Public Relations Officer of the AMA, Mr. Charles Parker- Allotey, the assembly started an ejection exercise some time last year, but a section of the hawkers started negotiations for a grace period to sell their products which they claimed had been imported into the country.

Based on this development, he said, the hawkers were allowed to sell on the streets throughout the Christmas period of last year with the hope that early this year, they may have found their way back to where they came from.

Continuing, Mr. Parker pointed out that the hawkers have now taken advantage of the situation, refusing any ejection exercise put forward by the assembly and forcing authorities to decide on whatever means possible to bring Accra back to sanity.

He was also of the view that most of the hawkers on the streets have already been allocated spots to sell their products at the market places but disregard for law and order and the huge profits they make within a short period of time have made them adamant not to quit the pavements.

Explaining further, Mr. Parker-Allotey revealed that some hawkers are able to make profit to the tune of about ?4million a month without paying taxes, which, according to him, deprives the country of revenue which could otherwise have been used to provide some basic infrastructure.

Asked to comment on the ages of the hawkers, he noted that children as young as 10 years are involved in the practice, whilst older persons above 50 years also indulge in the hawking business, adding that AMA is under no obligation to provide sites for street hawkers to sell their products.

He said streets around the Makola, UTC, CMB, Tema Station and Tudu are mostly abused by these hawkers who sell shoes, shirts, bags, second-hand clothing, among other things, on them.

Commenting on some of the dangers hawkers pose to innocent lives and the country as a whole, Mr. Allotey remarked that apart from the heavy vehicular traffic jams they create to obstruct drivers on the streets as a result of their activities, they also drive pedestrians onto the paths of moving vehicles which, most at times, result into fatal accidents.

He, however, gave the assurance that AMA is to enforce a what he called a Traffic Decongestion Policy that would ensure the free movement of vehicles and pedestrians in the city centres.