Stop paying lip-service to small traders, they pay taxes and rates

Building and shelters which were damaged by the Gikomba fire that left 16 people dead. [Photo: File, Standard]

Gikomba market traders have suffered long enough, and it is time authorities led by the national government, stopped giving lip-service to them.

For 18 years, these traders have lost 20 lives directly and hundreds of livelihoods shattered by the periodic infernos, which nobody seems to be willing to extinguish.