As several vendors trading on the municipal wharf aback of the Stabroek Market continue to do so in the shadow of imminent danger, City Hall still has no clear idea as to when promised rehabilitation work will be done to restore the area rendered unsafe by two separate structural collapses in September last year and again in March this year.
A conversation with City Hall Public Relations Officer Debra Lewis earlier this week yielded only a disclosure that the council continued to be in talks with officials of the Ministry of Public Infrastructure over planned works in the area. Lewis hinted at a broader rehabilitation exercise aback of the city’s historic market, which she said would include the rebuilding of the office of the Clerk of Markets though she said that she had “no clear idea” as to when works will start. The initial work, she said, will include the demolition of the dilapidated and rotting structure above the Demerara River, a task which would require technical expertise.
When Stabroek Business visited the area earlier this week vendors continued to trade in the shadow of a tragedy a full year after the first collapse. Lewis said she believed they would have already been notified of the municipality’s wish that they leave the area, and it was unclear as to why they remain there.
This newspaper has been informed that trading areas have already been allocated to another old but usable stelling area and outside the market itself. “Everyone will be accommodated. Some may not be entirely happy but everyone will be allocated a trading space,” Lewis said.
During the extended telephone interview with this newspaper, Lewis disclosed that with the Bedford building outside Bourda Market now having been demolished, the council was now having to focus its attention on ridding the area of the considerable amounts of garbage that had been dumped in the building and remedying the problem of stagnant water that had been created over the years.
Stabroek Business has also learnt that any chance of the vendors who used to occupy the area outside the now demolished school house returning there has been dashed by the purchase of the land by a private developer whom, this newspaper understands, may be developing a fast food facility.
Asked about the displaced vendors, Lewis said that some had been relocated in the Orange Walk area but she was of the impression that a few of them were still “brooding over the situation.”
