427 vendors from the demolished Park Yard market have failed to secure space in Usafi Market, a facility initially acquired by Kampala Capital City Authority to absorb vendors from the city streets.
Usafi which is adjacent to the clock tower, a few minutes from the city centre, in Kampala Central Division was adjusted to accommodate up to 5,000 vendors. However, it had 3,500 occupied stalls at the time of the controversial demolition of Nakivubo Park Yard Market.
Peter Kivumbi, the chairperson of Usafi Market Traders Association told our reporter that they received applications from 1,292 vendors but only managed to get stalls for 865 vendors. He added that 427 genuine applicants could not be taken on; while another 300 other applicants were rejected for disguising themselves as Park Yard traders.
The stalls were allocated on Monday after nearly two weeks of waiting.
"In our findings, we learnt that people who came here to apply for stalls but have never been vendors. Other vendors have been allocated space at Ham Shopping Mall and they also wanted space here. We detected them and rejected their applications," he said.
He said Usafi market leadership will allocate 40 stalls to disabled vendors who came from Park Yard market within this week. Kivumbi said the disabled vendors were a bit unsystematic and delayed to submit their application forms.
"We have just received their applications. They brought their forms last week on Wednesday and we asked them to come back this week, Kivumbi said.
Park Yard started in 1980s as a vending place for people with disabilities supported by local leaders. When city authorities embarked on a massive exercise to evict vendors from Kampala Streets, they found it easy to relocate themselves to the yard, adjacent to Nakivubo stadium since the place was open and being occupied by few disabled people.
