By Rex Mphisa
THE Beitbridge Municipality must build a proper market before relocation of traders at the fresh produce market ordinarily referred to as “Speed”.
The new market should be complete with adequate ablution facilities and running water, among other facilities, making it an improvement from the current make-shift site from where traders should now give way to the Central Business District (CBD) development .
Departing from his prepared speech during the ground-breaking ceremony of the new CBD, Matabeleland South Minister of Provincial Affairs and Devolution Albert Nguluvhe touched on a topical issue as regards Speed Market, Beitbridge’s health time bomb.
Authorities and stakeholders are paying a blind eye to the potentially disastrous site where sewer regularly flows to where Beitbridge residents buy fresh farm supplies.
Even a recent fire disaster has not shaken he powers that be.
“You must build proper facilities before relocating these people. We cannot continue to have a market like this,” he said.
“You must have water, toilets and proper shelters before relocating these people from Speed,” Nguluvhe said.
At the moment, despite numerous appeals, the Municipality of Beitbridge (MoB), through an old porous, primitive and vulnerable to abuse system, collects between R15 and R30 from each of the thousands of vendors littered across the sprawling town running all sorts of trading.
Although there has been differences between the policy-makers and residents on one side against the executive as regards the accounting of the millions realised the general public does not know the several millions of rands is used for.
Recently a fire believed to have been triggered by illegally stored fuel swept across part of the market inflicting a loss MoB Fire Brigade 9calculated at US$60 000.
The traders who lost their goods were not compensated and referred by MoB to the District Coordinator’s office for public assistance.
MoB has resolved to put their new fresh Market on an open space in the New Medium High Density suburb along Bulawayo Road but faces resistance from residents who argue the market will affect the values of their houses.
Some have argued that there has never been a fresh supplies market in an upmarket suburb.