Govt should have engaged street vendors

Political and Governance Analyst Mark Simuuwe says government should have first engaged street vendors before the decision to remove them from the streets vendors was implemented, especially because street vending is not an offence according to the Zambian laws.

Mr. Simuuwe tells QTV news that a survey should have been conducted to ascertain how many of these vendors are educated and how far they have gone with their education, how many are male, female, youths and the elderly and also which areas they come from to trade on the streets.

He says this should have been followed by ascertaining were exactly they were going to be relocated to after being removed from the streets.

Mr Simuuwe states that a survey would have given guidance of what to do and what step to take next.

He says while he is aware that government has put in place a framework, how the framework is communicated to the people matters more especially that government does not even have an inventory of how many vendors are involved if an alternative place was to be found.