Spare a thought for these lowly traders in city
What you need to know:
There are enough warning signs that a growing sense of grievance among small traders might blow up some day.
In the past one month alone, some sections of the small traders have been on the receiving end of very inhumane law enforcement.
Boda boda riders are also increasingly getting restless at being blocked from dropping or picking passengers in the CBD.
No one embodies the sheer will and creativity to survive in Kenya’s difficult economic environment like the small trader in Nairobi.
The Mama Mboga wakes up before everyone else in the estate every day and braves the biting dawn cold going to Marikiti, the city’s biggest fresh produce market, to feed the high demand for cheap grocery among low-income households.
The roadside stationery or sweets vendor jumps onto a passenger bus in a traffic jam, has only a minute or two to deliver his or her sales pitch before the vehicle gets moving again and somehow ends up selling quite a few pencils, rulers, candies or chewing gum.
CRIMINALISATION
The evening fruits vendor on Tom Mboya Street appears to risk everything.
A little baby strapped to her back and a slightly older one holding onto her leso, she has to do a quick sale while remaining on high alert to dodge the thuggish city askaris and the matatu pulling up dangerously one step away.
The daily struggles of the Kenyan small trader are, of course, a manifestation of an unemployment and inequality crisis that has cried out for sound policy solutions for years.
But what we see instead is an increasing criminalisation and scapegoating of small trade by the county government and national security agencies, and an elite class looking down on a section of Kenyans struggling to earn an honest living by labelling them a menace.
RUNNING BATTLES
In the past one month alone, some sections of the small traders have been on the receiving end of very inhumane law enforcement. Fresh produce sellers at Marikiti protesting harassment by county government askaris spent the better part of last Thursday and Wednesday in running battles with police under a cloud of teargas.
A colleague went to buy fresh fish at the popular City Market in the CBD last week and found the place deserted, the Mama Samaki traders in checked aprons having been recently thrown out by City Hall. The legendary Gikomba Market fire returned recently to raze more stalls and goods.
Boda boda riders are increasingly getting restless at being blocked from dropping or picking passengers in the CBD.
GIKOMBA FIRE
In all the cases, the authorities have greatly compromised whatever good intentions they had by not providing a proper alternative, using excessive force, not addressing underlying suspicions and demonstrating discrimination.
The Gikomba fire victims, for instance, once again blamed their plight on a possible land grab attempt, a practice that normally features politically-connected individuals and government officials in the background.
The City Market evictees were reportedly deemed a menace to the richer butchery owners who sell fish fillets or whole fish from the fridge and can pay higher county government levies.
This amounts to taking Nairobi on a dangerous path. There are enough warning signs that a growing sense of grievance among small traders might blow up some day.
