The City of Johannesburg, today, commenced with a process to verify informal traders trading in the Inner City of Johannesburg.
The verification process seeks to register all traders who are legally supposed to be trading in the streets of Johannesburg.
This comes on the backdrop of the City’s strategic intervention in the Inner City known as “Clean Sweep” programme, which led to traders being removed from certain street. Clean Sweep is a strategic intervention vehicle which seeks to tackle service delivery challenges in the Inner City. It plays a supporting role to other citywide programmes like Integrated Service Delivery progamme, Ward Based Planning and the Joburg Ten Plus where the Joburg Metro Police are concentrating on crime prevention, traffic policing as well as by-laws compliance in the each ward.
The initiative seeks to address challenges that are experienced in the Inner City, which include the following:
Illegal Trading
Illegal dumping and littering
Land and building invasions and other By-law contraventions
Illegal connection of infrastructure including theft of electricity
Lack of a sense of Civic Pride and ownership.
The City is committed to regulate informal trading business in the Inner City of Johannesburg.
Illegal trading brings with it a number of challenges wherever is take place in the City. These include among others congestion, crime, grime, littering and general breakdown of other service – including blocking of storm water channels and water leaks.
The City of Johannesburg acknowledges the relevance and contribution of informal trading to the economic and social life of the City. Informal Trading provides income to the unemployed and also represent an alternative to established formal retail sector.
The City aims to develop the sector and its participants to be commercially viable, and this will in turn contribute to the economic growth of the City and the quality of life of its citizens in a sustainable manner.
While the needs of street traders to sustain their livelihood and exploit future economic opportunities are important, a balance has to be struck with the needs of commuters, pedestrians, formal businesses, residents and other users of the side walk space. In this way, the City of Johannesburg can have clean, safe and well-organised public environments.
As part of the ongoing efforts by the City to create a conducive environment for informal trading, the City of Johannesburg leadership met with the informal sector leadership to bring the situation back to normal.
Some of the immediate actions agreed to by the team are:
The City resumes immediately with a verification process to establish the traders who are eligible to trade in the Inner City.
The verification process will also establish if people are in the City legally (the Department of Home Affair has been invited to assist in this regard)
The process of verification will resume in Hoek, Devilliers, King Goerge, Wanderers, Albertina Sisulu, Klein and President streets.
Legal traders be allocated according to trading places available in these streets
Illegal traders will not be allowed in the streets of Johannesburg.
All legal traders must adhere to the house rules by keep their trading places neat and allow for free flow of pedestrians and vehicles.
The City appreciates the commitment and support shown by the informal trader’s leadership to ensure that this process is expedited for the benefit of all affected –
Issued by the City of Johannesburg