Kabul vendors daily grease police palm to operate

KABUL (Pajhwok): Around 500,000 vendors are active in capital Kabul and according to an estimate police and Kabul Municipality take daily as many as 20 million afghanis illegally from them.

Currently, around 500,000 vendors operate in different parts of capital Kabul and there is a surge in their number as unemployment is on the increase.

With the increase in unemployment in the country, this figure is increasing because vendor job does not require much facilities and capital but vendors say they get work permits  in exchange for illegally paying some money to police and municipal employees.

Vendors’ complaints:

Rahmatullah, a hand-cart owner in Muradkhani locality, told Pajhwok Afghan News: “We pay daily 20 afs that become 600 afs monthly to police. Municipality employees from Municipality District 1 also force us to pay them weekly. Some pay 150 afs weekly and some 200 afs.”

He said he is forced to pay to police and municipality officials because he has no other option except running the hand-cart.

He said: “I was driver with a company, a year ago our company closed down and I started selling fruit because I did not have much capital and this doesn’t need a lot of capital, many people sell things on cars because they cannot afford other things; But (police and municipal employees) do not allow us to work and ask for money from us.”

Ahmad Samim, another vendor who sold detergents on a hand-carter, said: “On the one hand, our sales on down and on the other we are facing police violence and traffic. We pay 20 afghanis a day to the police to allow us to work here, vendors also pay 20 afghanis a day to municipal employees.”

He said: “If we do not pay the police and municipality officials, they will come and beat us, they will force us to leave the area, if we pay, they will not say anything again only on the days when the senior officials come in the morning suggest you go to another area of the city.”

Hayatullah, another vendor selling vegetable on a hand-carter in the Kota-e-Sangi area, said: “Hand-carter is charged 100 afs weekly, stalls and other vendors on the footpath are charged 20 to 50 afs daily.”

He said in every area a policeman was tasked to collect money from vendors and he distributed the money to police and municipality officials.

When asked he replied: “If we complain, it will not solve the problem and instead cause us trouble, and we will have to endure any hardship for the sake of our children’s alimony, daily we get humiliated and pay money.”

Jamal, another vendor in the Lyci Maryam area of Kabul City, said he sells plastic made tools on a hand-cart. He said municipality officials weekly collected 150 afs from vendors otherwise they could not sell things.

He said their representative from vendors daily collected 20 afs from vendors and handover the amount to police at the end of the week.

He said often officials came to them to resolve their problems but still their problems remained unaddressed.

Abdul Sattar, another hand-cart vendor in the Sar-e-Shamali locality of Kabul, said all vendors here paid 30 afs to police daily.

He said: “Only the revenue of stalls installed by municipality in some areas went to the state treasury and money collected from other irregular vendors went to private pockets.”

Pajhwok talked to more vendors who confirmed they paid weekly or daily to police and municipality officials and in case of denial they were unable to work.

Vendors daily pay around 20 million Afs:

A well-placed source in Kabul Municipality, wishing not to be named, said according to their information over 500,000 vendors worked in 22 municipality districts of Kabul.

According to vendors, police and municipality officials daily collected 20 afs from each hand-cart vendor and 50 afs from staller and other vendors.

Keeping in mind the number of vendors and the mount collected from them, police and municipality daily collected 20 million afs from vendors.

Extortionists will be dealt in line with the law:

Kabul Police Spokesperson Firduos Faramarz said police were responsible to eradicate corruption and it was not acceptable that police should be involved in corruption.

He said a mechanism was in place to trace officials who allegedly collected money from vendors. In such cases vendors could register their complaints with police and will all available resources these complaints would be addressed.

Sameera Rasa, Kabul Municipality spokesperson, said in the past some police officials involved in collection of bribe from vendors had been arrested.

He said: “It is not right that municipal employees charge vendors for money, the department has not received money from any of the vendor but in order to maintain better order in the city and to arrange the vendors in different areas, we have designed several booths that are distributed to real peddlers who make a living from peddling activities, and now Kabul Municipality is in the biometric stage of peddlers.”

Referring to the repeated complaints of vendors that police and municipality officials charged them daily or weekly he said; “Perhaps someone receives money from them under various pretexts in the name of being a municipal employee, please give them my contact number. We are pursuing this issue and whoever it is must be punished.”

He said municipality was committed to dealing with corrupt elements under the legal framework and nobody has the right to use the name of municipality for its personal benefit.

He asked vendors to cooperate with Municipality and identify individuals who asked them for money. Such individuals he pledged would be removed from job and referred to investigative bodies.

This comes as Pajhwok Afghan News in the past published similar reports and officials pledged to refer such elements to the legal organs for punishment. But according to vendors, the problem still exists.

This report has been produced by Pajhwok and financially supported by UNDP and Denmark.

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