Police has blocked a meeting convened by operators in the New Taxi Park to reject their eviction from the park to pave way for reconstruction. Last month, Jennifer Musisi, the Kampala Capital City Authority-KCCA Executive Director issued an eviction notice to vendors, lockup proprietors and taxi operators to vacate the New Taxi park by September 1 to pave way for the construction works to begin. But on Tuesday afternoon, about 300 people operating in the Taxi Park convened a meeting to oppose their abrupt eviction.
The meeting kicked off at about 2:00 but it was blocked by heavily armed Anti Riot Police. Umaru Lwanga, who operates Lock number 9 inside New Taxi Park, told URN the cops declared the meeting unlawful and ordered them to disperse. URN found Kitumwa Lusoke, the District Police Commander Old Kampala involved in a heated argument with the vendors who were protesting the decision by police to block their meeting.
Hakimu Kawuma, one of the lock owners said they had a right to hold a meeting within the taxi park because that is where they operate from. He explained that, despite the fact that the eviction deadline is only two days away, KCCA has not allocated them an alternative place to operate from. Katumwa said their eviction has come at a bad time because they have to send back their children to school. Mohamood Mukiibi, another lock up owner wonders why KCCA gave away the tender to reconstruct the Taxi Park without consulting them.
Mukiibi contends that if the authority had consulted them the issue of their eviction would have been resolved smoothly. He asks the authority to give them a grace period of up to December to allow them to relocate their business to other areas. When URN toured the Lock ups, some of them that were locked had notices directing customers to their new areas of operation. By the time of flying this story, heavily armed policemen were still occupying the taxi park area.
