A week is approaching since a massive fire obliterated the Parika Market complex while it was in the second phase of rehabilitation and the dozens of affected vendors are patiently awaiting the further intervention of the government after being promised a grant of $300,000 each by President Irfaan Ali on Monday.
Although most of the vendors were absent yesterday when Stabroek News visited the burnt shell of the complex, one of them who wished not to be name contended that the grant being offered cannot compensate her for the amount of gold jewellery, clothes, fruits, and other products that she was selling and opined that she has suffered the heaviest losses compared to other vendors.
According to the woman, she occupied approximately three quarters of the market complex since she had taken possession of many of the abandoned stalls and was renting them. “I suffer the most loss because I used to use like three quarter of the market… most of them stalls that people abandoned and leff I started to use them and I used to pay rent for them… each of the stall them have different price, it depends on the size of the stall so different size, different price we does gah pay.”
Asked if they were warned as stated by the Chairman of Region Three, Inshan Ayube, to evacuate the complex to facilitate the second phase of the rehabilitation of the market which was ongoing at the time of the fire, she replied by denying that the vendors within the market complex were given notice and said that such was only done for vendors who were outside of the complex on the road parapet.
“Up to last week Monday he was here and he tell the vendors who were in front of the market like on the road side, the parapet side, that they had to move but he didn’t tell us who were in the market of itself to move, just them that was on the parapet, and he promised to come back, but he come back Friday on the day of the fire…” She added that even during the first phase of rehabilitation they were still allowed to vend inside the complex.
The woman said that although hers and fellow vendors’ businesses were insured, there are many others who weren’t and as such they are now all left in an uncertain state since they have no place to ply their trade come Friday.
“They call we to go yesterday [Monday] to the State House because the president promise to help us and that he gon send down his minister them today [Tuesday], so leh we wait and see what justice we gonna get, what help we gonna get, and then if we nah satisfy then we could able fuh seh more on the matter but for now I’m done talking… we could do with any little thing to start back we business”, she said.
The few other vendors who were present said that they would usually buy their products from the Chinese supermarkets in the area and travel to Georgetown to purchase additional items such as clothing and more, and would store them in their stalls at the market. They also said that they would purchase certain fruits from persons who traverse the Essequibo River from areas such as Pomeroon and even Region One to be resold.
Meanwhile, while at Parika yesterday, attempts were made by Stabroek News to get a comment from Panko Steel Fabrication and Construction, the company that was doing work on the market complex when the fire erupted, but the workers and even the persons who were present and who were said to be in charge at the time refused to speak. Calls to the contractor’s cellphone also went unanswered.
Midst
When this newspaper visited the scene yesterday, the company was in the midst of clearing away the burnt materials.
This newspaper also spoke to Ayube yesterday to discuss the issue of liability in the aftermath of the fire and the next step for the vendors. He stated that he has not been presented with a detailed and official investigation of the fire and as such he was not in a position to discuss the matter. The Guyana Fire Service has said that the blaze was caused by sparks from a welding torch that fell into a storage bond and ignited nearby combustible materials.
The chairman said that a decision to have the vendors placed somewhere else will have to be made by either the president or the ministers.
Asked why the vendors weren’t given notice to remove from the market complex since phase one of the rehabilitation project began, the chairman responded, “Nothing was impeding the vendors when the work was going on in the first phase, but when that phase was done the vendors were informed, and we gave them a sale for the Christmas holiday and they were supposed to move after the Christmas holiday but they failed to do so… last week Monday I had a meeting with them because I said we can’t continue with them later than this month and unfortunately the fire was Friday.”
“Many vendors were not occupying inside the market, a lot of stands were just empty, a lot of stands were just repossessed because over a number of years people were not paying rentals, we were not seeing them, so it might have had a lot of stalls inside the market but many were unoccupied,” he added.
The chairman said that the construction company’s second phase of works consisted of constructing a steel frame for the market.
On Friday, many of the vendors complained that upon the arrival of the fire service there was hardly any water in their tanks. As such, when the question was posed yesterday if at any point in time discussions had taken place to construct a fire station in the vicinity of the Parika market and if there were hydrants within the area, the chairman replied by stating that to his knowledge no talks on a station were ever held. He noted that they were in the process of installing hydrants around the market area.
Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Nigel Dharamlall, was contacted yesterday by Stabroek News and asked about the outcome of the meeting which was held with the vendors. Although he did acknowledge that the meeting was held, he informed that he was not at liberty to say what was discussed and if any decisions were made.
Concerning the vendors’ claims that the fire service took hours to arrive on the scene, a release from the Guyana Fire Service has refuted this. “According to the allegations, the first fire truck took more than an hour to arrive on scene. This allegation is false, as the Fire Department was alerted to the fire at 3:14 p.m. and the first tender, which is stationed at the Leonora Fire Station, arrived on the scene at 3:36 pm.”
It went on to say, “There are also allegations that the fire trucks arrived on scene without water, which is also false. It is important to note that fire trucks carry 400 gallons of water, which is expended in a matter of minutes. Due to the magnitude of the fire, the tank supplies were not enough to contain it. Before the tank supplies were diminished, firefighters had set up a water relay system using a light pump that accessed water from the Essequibo River.”
