Kasese traders abandon stalls over high rent

By Wilson Asiimwe

There is a saying: “when the new moon shines, even the crippled ones cry for a walk.” And the moon did shine in October last year, when the Kasese district local government, in partnership with the Belgian Technical Corporation, constructed 482 stalls at Lubiriha Market, along the Mpondwe border with the Democratic Republic of Congo. The building, which cost sh1.6b, is part of the poverty reduction programme for Kasese.

In the authorities’ minds, there was no doubt that when the stalls were advertised in mid-October 2013, they would be taken up immediately. But four months later, the stalls are empty. Traders opt to sell their merchandise outside the stalls.

According to Kimole Masika, a dealer in household items, everyone thought the stalls would be rented to the traders who used to operate from the open stalls in the market.

“By the time we applied, the stalls had been taken by people who wanted to rent them out to us,” Masika says. The traders, through their association — Lubiriha Market Traders Association — accuse the town council authorities of acting in isolation while planning for the market. Stanley Pandasi, the chairperson, believes the town council made a mistake of levying the rental fees without involving the traders.

The traders rejected the sh31,000 monthly rent for the stalls because they expected them to be free since it was a government programme for poverty reduction.

However, the town clerk, Eva Biira, refutes allegations that the sh31,000 monthly rent is the reason the stalls were abandoned. She says of the 482 stalls, only 16 are occupied by the traders.

But, there were 82 people who applied for the stalls in order to rent them out to traders. These stalls have not been occupied since.

“The issue of high rent is not true because apart from the 466 stalls for non-business people, the rest should be occupied. The traders applied and paid for them,” Biira says.

Pandasi, however, asks why the remaining stalls have not been occupied if the people who paid for them were genuine traders.

He added that the traders want to pay sh10,000 only per month since they continue to pay market dues to the tenderer on market days (Tuesday and Friday).

The Kasese district boss Lt Col (Rtd) Mawa Muhindo, says they plan to reconcile the two sides. “We shall not sit back and see donor money go to waste. We are going to organise a meeting with the traders and the town council officials and come up with a solution,” he says.

The market attracts nearly 50,000 people on market day, including Congolese.