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THIS IS GUYANA AT CHRISTMAS TIME

Dec 19, 2009 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

Visitors and returning Guyanese were given a rousing welcome when they deplaned this past week at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport, Timehri. The warm reception was a promotion put on by the Ministry of Tourism.
It was well received. Most of the persons that arrived felt good at the reception they received and quite a few admitted that it put them immediately in the Christmas mood. And what better place to spend the Christmas holidays than in Guyana where the weather is good, the people are friendly and involved in Christmas as few places are in the world. There is no better place to spend the holidays than in Guyana, or rather this is how it used to be.
For those enjoying the warm welcome put on at the airport, the reality will hit them one hour after they arrive in the capital city and see the pavements overflowing with vendors forcing pedestrians to use the roadways. The Christmas fun ends there.
We seem to so easily forget our history. We seem to forget that there was a time when shopping in the city was a nightmare because of what had developed on our pavements. Almost the entire Regent Street was years ago converted to a tent city and vendors simply squatted in front of business and over drains and wherever else they felt they could vend their wares.
And the excuse for not taking condign action then, as it probably no doubt is today, is that we are dealing with a complex problem. Not so. What makes it complex is the simplicity of the rationalization of what was taking place throughout the commercial district.
Businesses suffered because many were not keen to browsing – the new label placed on those who scout around before making purchases. The vendors also did not do well. In fact even today they are not going to do well.
Action was eventually taken to bring back things to some degree of order. The pavements were cleared and almost immediately we saw a transformation in local commerce businesses boomed and more and more investors expanded and upgraded their operations creating hundreds of new jobs. It just shows that if the laws of our country can be rigidly enforced, it is not just the rich that will benefit but also the poor, since more and more jobs will be created.
The situation today is not as bad as during the days of Tent City but we are fast approaching that period when things will not get any better and we will return to the times when business slumped. What is even more unfortunate is that the activities of the illegal pavement vendors are affecting legitimate vendors at the new Vendors Mall on Water Street location and those within the markets and its precincts who are operating their own stall and doing so within the confines of the law.  Those persons who operate those stalls spent hundreds of thousands to build their structures and today they are not getting the business that they ought to because other persons without these costs are undercutting them by illegally vending on our pavements.
It is not too complex a problem to resolve, and it is not insurmountable. But politicians are always mindful of votes and are thus not likely to demand that action be taken at this time to clear the pavements so that those coming home for the holidays can experience an orderly city and enjoy spending some money while in Guyana. It is going to be chaos as the final days before Christmas approach and I am sure that the confusion that will experienced will form a lasting impression on the minds of those visiting from overseas.
This need not have happened, but like so much else we allow things to slip after they have improved. On top of all this confusion and the frenetic haste to escape this confusion, one is confronted with a masquerade band, their members standing in the middle of the roadways soliciting funds at risk to life and limb and at the expense of creating further bottlenecks to traffic.
Well, what can I say but Welcome to Guyana!

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