Downtown Kingston vendors protest

ANGRY vendors in downtown Kingston yesterday staged a demonstration on Orange Street to protest against what they described as the unfair treatment being meted out to them by the police.

The vendors claimed they have become targets by the police who have intensified operations to remove vendors from the sidewalks of the commercial district.

"The police them a treat us unfairly; they take away our carts and goods and we don't get them back [and] at times when our goods are returned they are damaged or the quantity is less," one vendor told the Jamaica Observer.

Some of the vendors shouted at the police while bearing placards, some of which read: 'Where is the prime minister'; 'School fees and bills need to be paid'.

One vendor, Cornelia McDonald, who has been selling in downtown Kingston for more than a decade, described her experience with police officers as tormenting and abusive.

"Them a seize our goods, dash them away and we are being locked up, fined and required to pay up to $11,000 for their return sometimes," McDonald said.

"Me get beaten from police four weeks ago. Them beat me up and pepper spray me, then took me to the police station. After I was released my handbag with my money, keys and documents were missing and none of them could give an account. Even though this happens we are still being charged", McDonald further stated.

She said that while she understands the effort the police were making to remove vendors from the streets, the market to which they have been being directed does not have enough space.

"It's graduation time now and they are seizing our goods, how we children a go manage, they are stopping our job and a our 'pickney' a go feel it," said McDonald.

One female vendor claimed that she was told to become a prostitute to earn money when she asked the police about an alternative job when her goods were seized. "They said you affi go work a New Kingston (to sell body) if you can't make a profit anyway else," she said.

Nehemiah Henry, a vendor for over three decades, vowed to keep up the protes

t until better provisions have been made for he and his colleagues, saying vending was his only source of income.

"I will protest for the entire week if I have to, there is no other way of getting money. I don't rob or kill people, this is my honest bread and now I'm being hindered from earning it. There are no systems or provisions in place for us to go to the market...," said Henry.

The angry vendors said that in the current economic situation it was difficult to progress and that the clampdown by the police could lead to violence, adding that their cry for a better system has fallen on deaf ears. One vendor said the city's mayor has been silent on the matter and vowed that their frustration would be reflected on the ballot paper in the next election as they have lost hope.

"We will not vote again, especially for the mayor, as she has done nothing for our support," said one angry vendor.

The Kingston and St Andrew Corporation is now controlled by the People's National Party and led by Mayor Angela Brown Burke.