Luchenza Municipal Council to remove street vendors on Monday

Luchenza Municipal Council says preparations to remove vendors from the streets have reached an advanced stage, saying come Monday next week the council will not allow street vending.

Chief Executive Officer for Luchenza Municipal Council, Sellina Chimphamba said the council conducted a meeting with market committees for Chonde and Luchenza on issues bordering on street vending and Covid-19-related matters earlier this week.

Chimphamba said that the meeting resolved that all vendors should move out of the streets to designated places and those who will fail to relocate voluntarily will meet law enforcing agencies in the process.

“Luchenza Market Committee already briefed traders while the market committee for Chonde will brief traders on Thursday (today). Our office will do announcements via Public Address System probably on Sunday so that the message can be wide spread.

“Come Monday, police will start enforcement and we have identified a place to allocate to all vendors who ply their trade along the Chonde-Mulanje Road and those at Luchenza will go in the market since it has not been occupied due to street vending,” said Chimphamba.

Chimphamba said both Luchenza and Chonde markets have enough space to accommodate all vendors, adding that they will use a grader to clear more space.

Government has recently been removing street vendors starting from Lilongwe, Mzuzu, Blantyre and other places in a bid to bring sanity on how business is conducted.

A similar exercise took place in Limbe last week where Blantyre City Council authorities demolished shacks constructed in undesignated places. The demolition was part of councils plan to deal with illegal vending in the city.