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Thursday,
Nov14, 2013
Illiterates
rule!
The thorny issue of street trading
has once again reared its head in the national political debate, this time
with tragic consequences. One young schoolboy of the Ansarul Muslim Secondary School,
is dead,
gunned down in the school compound during a clash between pupils of
the school and petty traders who had erected makeshift stalls around the
environs of the school and at the entrance. The school, located in the
densely populated, deprived Guard
street area of Freetown, had apparently long complained to
the authorities that street trading and commercial activities were hindering
the learning process. The noise from these activities, including loud music
from unauthorized restaurants and bars made it difficult for teachers to be
heard in class. At the entrance to the school, swarms of trays and makeshift
stalls had to be negotiated, sometimes leading to altercations and disputes,
especially if one were inadvertently knocked over. The school had for some
years been blacklisted by WAEC, the regional examining body, as a center for
holding its exams, due to the unconducive
environment. This
East End police
station
…Called to the scene
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meant that students from the school taking these exams were
required to do so at other centers.
On Monday, November 11, matters
came to a head when, following altercations, threats and ultimatums issued
the previous week by the two sides, pupils of the school began dismantling
the makeshift stalls at the entrance to the school. Clashes erupted, with
exchanges of missiles between the schoolboys inside their compound and the
petty traders and area youths outside. Police personnel from the nearby East End Police station had to be called in and
responded with tear gas and possibly firing of live ammunition (this is under
investigation by the police). Injuries were sustained by all sides, and in
the process, the young student, Alhaji Barrie, lost
his life. Police at first denied responsibility, but now say the matter is
under investigation.
The question of street trading,
seemingly trivial, has proved to be one of the most thorny and intractable
issues of governance in Sierra
Leone.
The main argument of the traders, who exist in Freetown in the tens of thousands, is that
they have nowhere else to do their business but the streets, as government
has not built market stalls for them. Governments over decades, but
particularly this APC government, have been unable to firmly counter this
argument, partly because these petty traders now and historically have been a
main source of political support for the APC. As a result the petty traders
have assumed carte blanche to operate virtually anywhere in the city. They
have taken over entire streets of the municipality, displaying their wares
right in the middle of the road and effectively blocking vehicular access (Guard Street, the
area where this incident occurred is one such street). No street corner or sidewalk within the
city has been spared invasion by these street traders. If it so pleases them
they will take over your shop or home frontage and ruin your business or
drive you to distraction in your own home. They congregate in hordes, litter
the area, are loud and quarrelsome, create noise and confusion, hinder
access, attract undesirables, engage in illicit selling of alcohol and other
illegal activities, block the free flow of traffic and lead to a general
deterioration of the neighbourhood. There are laws
against many of these things, of course, but complain
to the police and you will encounter a blank wall. Go to the City Council and
you will find only deaf ears. Look to your councilor or MP and he/she will
not be found. The result is the petty traders, many of whom are illiterate
and originally from the provinces, rule the streets around you, and they can
drive you from your bona fide property.
The irony in this latest tragic
incident is that these poor young schoolchildren from this deprived
community, aspire to escape the cycle of poverty inherent in street trading.
They are struggling to acquire an education to make something of themselves, but this matters little to the hordes of
traders about them. If you enter the Kissy mental
home and attempt to associate with the inmates, you’ll discover that you are
the outsider, the outcast, the one with a problem. In a land where illiteracy
is allowed to rule, literacy and learning are not likely to be prized. One
could argue that the students should not have taken the law into their hands
by demolishing the makeshift stalls, but whose fault is this really? When you
have complained about something that is illegal for years and have seen no
response from those who are charged with upholding the law, and this
illegality is affecting your own future, are you not justified if you decide
to take matters into your hands?
The police have been accused,
credibly, of heavy handedness in this matter and of firing live ammunition.
This would be by no means the first time the police have used deadly force in
questionable circumstances (see US Marine
shot dead by Sierra Leone Police). In this
incident the police appear to have intervened on the side of the traders and
against the students. We have been told that some students have been
arrested. No doubt the police would claim that this is as a result of the situation
they encountered when they arrived on the scene.and
the response of the protagonists to police instructions. The police, however,
should not be seen to pick and choose in the enforcement of the laws, to
arrest when it pleases them and to turn a blind eye even for protracted
periods of time when they choose. The police, however, get their signals from
politicians, and if the politicians indicate to them they are happy, or at
least not unhappy, with street trading the police will ignore it.
The ultimate responsibility
lies of course with government. It is government’s duty to enforce the laws
and deal firmly with the traders. The argument that street trading is
justified because government has failed to provide markets is a preposterous
one, worthy of no more than a single line rebuttal: if government were to
provide stalls or shops for the tens of thousands of existing traders, what
then should government do if thousands more showed up a short while later
demanding their own stalls and shops? Rather than providing markets for these
people government should be providing an alternative vision for them, because
the path they are on only reinforces their poverty and indeed Sierra Leone’s
poverty. The seemingly simple violation of local bye laws is actually a
national economic problem. The majority of these petty traders are never
going to escape poverty, never going to escape street trading, and in all
probability neither will their children.
To encourage them in this pursuit is cruel; it consigns them to a
future without hope. What should they be doing? What could they be doing? In
truth, the only potential alternative for them is working the land. Which
raises the whole issue of why they left the land in the first place, and
agricultural practices
and land distribution in Sierra Leone and socio-cultural
organization in the provinces. These are questions the politicians avoid like
the plague, so the issues are swept under the carpet and the petty traders
are allowed to eke out their existence on the streets of Freetown. The more one delves into this
seemingly petty, local issue the more complicated it becomes and the more
national in scope
Sweeping the issue under the
carpet is like storing a time bomb ticking away. As the ranks of poor,
illiterate
or semi-literate traders in Freetown continue to swell, an entire
class of people without an alternative to the streets and the slums, the
potential consequences, political and social, become increasingly
unpredictable and uncontrollable Friction between street traders and other
groups within Freetown has occurred frequently in recent times. Educational
establishments have not been spared this friction. Earlier this year His
Excellency the President provoked outrage by floating the idea that the Annie
Walsh school, the oldest girls school in west Africa, long complaining of the
rampant street trading in its precincts, could be relocated and its historic
school buildings could be turned into a market for petty traders (read The Annie Walsh
Memorial School Issue) And
old Princewaleans have similarly long complained of
encroachment into the Prince of Wales School (read Prince of
Wales School – Symbol of a Dysfunctional System). Churches and
mosques have not been spared the unwelcome visitations either. Worshippers at
St George’s
Cathedral, the most prestigious church in the capital are greeted by the site
of pavement secondhand shoe sellers at the doorstep. All complaints to
authorities have fallen on deaf ears. The issue becomes even more
controversial when government forcibly acquires land in the city without
compensation, as it has done in recent times (read natinpasadvantage).
If it then allows traders to set up shop on the newly acquired land its
actions begin to look like a forcible redistribution of land within the city.
Earlier this year, in a surprise move, the APC launched Operation Wid, designed to clear the streets. With great fanfare,
President Ernest
Gibraltar
Church, Sani Abacha Street
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Koroma addressed the nation with the
Mayor and his council, top police brass and other senior government officials
and the leadership of the petty traders in attendance. All were in agreement
he assured us: laws would be enforced, the streets would be cleared and
traffic would flow freely. For a short while, Operation Wid
appeared to work, as street by street, ward by ward, petty traders were
peacefully urged off the street, makeshift structures, encroachments and
obstacles on the sidewalks were cleared and sanity seemed to be returning.
The improvement was shortlived. Petty traders’
organizations launched well attended protests. The main recalcitrants,
Sani Abacha Street and Guard Street were
never cleared, apparently because the authorities believed they would be the
most difficult. Apparently responding to political pressure, Operation Wid began to lose steam. The city council street patrols lessened, then disappeared. Today the situation is almost
back to where it was before the operation began. Street trading is back big
time.
So the government finds itself
guilty of at least three sins in this matter. First the President ignored the
issue completely in his first term. Then he encouraged the traders during his
campaign for reelection in 2012 to believe that he would continue to ignore
the issue. He donated money to traders’ groups and the traders responded
massively in support of the APC. Having encouraged the traders to believe he
would continue to support them he did exactly the opposite by launching
Operation Wid. And then, when he discovered the operation appeared to be
causing a loss of political support, he reversed himself and pulled back on
Operation Wid. So guilty on at least three counts: Recklessness and
irresponsibility on count 1, deception on count 2, and weakness and
indecision on count 3.
A trip to Ansarul
school on Thursday, November 14 included a nightmarish walk along the 200
yard stretch of Guard Street
from Clock Tower. What should have been a three-minute walk took twenty or
twenty-five. At every step a mass of traders selling all manner of wares
competes for space with the few vehicles foolhardy enough to risk travel on
what used to be one of the main gateways in to the city..
At every step pedestrian traffic comes up against a vehicular or human
obstacle. Stinking, slimy mud underfoot makes each step uncertain. An
infestation of flies
means one is best advised to keep one’s mouth firmly shut.
Traders drag their baskets and trays into the middle of the road, very
reluctantly pull them back to make space for vehicles that honk loudly
enough, then promptly drag them back into the middle
of the road. INMATES HAVE TAKEN OVER THE ASYLUM; SANITY IS ENDANGERED.
At the school we found slightly
more space. Under the watchful eye of armed policemen, area youths were
breaking down traders stalls that had been lined up against the school wall. The
area was crowded, but the
Ansarul School,
Guard Street
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atmosphere was without tension; there was no sign of the violence
that had erupted only a few days earlier. School appeared to have been
suspended; there was no sign of students within the school compound or its
environs.
The destruction of the traders stalls that we observed tells us two things.
First, the authorities are now acknowledging that the school was at least
partially correct in its earlier complaints and are belatedly taking action
on the matter. Why did it have to take the death of Alhaji
Barrie to accomplish this? What about all the others that have similar
complaints, the businesses and residences, whose neighbourhoods
have been taken over by traders? Don’t they have the same rights to peace and
quiet in their environment? Is it that only violence will enable them to
enjoy their rights as Sierra Leoneans?
The second thing the peaceful
demolition of the stalls tells us (and we had already learnt this from
Operation Wid) is that government has it in its
power to remove traders from the streets whenever it wants. The politicians
and the police know this. The traders themselves realize this; they know that
they operate on the streets with the tacit approval of the politicians and that
if that approval is withdrawn they must relocate. This is what emboldens
traders to set up shop as they please within the city. Ultimately, unless
politicians demonstrate the requisite vision and political will, the problem
of street trading will only increase in Freetown.
It’s a frightening thought.
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