By George Henry, Gleaner WriterSPALDINGS, Clarendon:
THE MANDEVILLE Municipal Market became a scene of confusion on Saturday when members of the Island Special Constabulary Force (ISCF) in collaboration with municipal police in the Manchester capital, tried to get vendors who sell along the driveway at that facility to ply their wares inside the building.
Vendors, who sell mainly ground provisions along the driveway, were seen running from the officers on numerous occasions on Saturday, in an effort to escape from what they described to The Gleaner as police brutality.
According to Lovie Andrews, she has been selling at the Mandeville market for over eight years along the driveway on the compound of that facility, although the operators of the market have marked out designated areas outside the market for vendors to sell. The police constables as well as the municipal police continue to prevent them from plying their wares there.
Miss Andrews pointed out that from Thursday of last week she and her colleagues have been subjected to harassment from the constables and the police, as they try to get them to sell inside what she described as an overcrowded market.
She pointed out that the men and woman representing both groups seized their goods and abused a number of her colleagues.
"A pure disadvantage the 'metro and the police them taking with the vendors in the market, because they run us down and take away our goods and whenever anyone talk or try to resist they beat them. My baby father who was talking on behalf of the women was taken to the police station and locked up," said Ms. Andrews.
INADEQUATE VENDING SPACE
Miss Andrews said that although members of the Island Special Constabulary Force and the municipal police were forcing them to sell inside of the market, the vending space there was inadequate.
However, when Special Sergeant Devon Gordon, who arrived at the facility at about 3:45 p.m. to carry out routine checks was contacted, he told The Gleaner that there was adequate space inside the facility, and so, vendors have no need to sell along the driveway.
He said the vendors would always say the space for vending in the market is inadequate, and if they insisted that they would not go inside the facility, the police would also insist that they do not sell outside the facility.
With regards to the woman said to have been beaten by the municipal police, Special-Sergeant Gordon said she has always behaved in a boisterous manner and vendors have been tutoring her to behave badly, including stoning the police whenever they go to the facility to carry out their duties.
"The woman has always behaved in a boisterous manner. The vendors or higglers inside here tutor her whenever they see the municipal police or the police, they tutor her to do all sort of things, including taking up bottles and stones to throw at us," said Sergeant Gordon.
He added that if vendors had a problem they should have contacted the Manchester Parish Council to air their grouses, as the police was only at the market enforcing the law, while they assist the municipal police in enforcing the vending regulations.
