By Morish Dramadri

Arua city

There was drama in Arua city council hall after the new tenants of Arua city modern taxi park stormed the meeting of the old tenants with a committee constituted by the city council to handle the irregularities at the taxi park.

For long, Arua city modern Taxi Park had a lot of irregularities ranging from ownership and allocation of the Lockups, power, and security among others that prompted the tenants to stage a demonstration in the office of the division mayor of the central division on Tuesday 18^th, July 2023 to seek clarity on these irregularities.

The concerns raised by the businessmen and women prompted the city and the division council to set up a committee comprising of technocrats from the two entities to investigate the accusations by the tenants.   

The meeting chaired by the committee leader who also doubles as the city lawyer turned chaotic after the disgruntled new tenants decided to evict the old tenants from the council hall following the long meeting of the old tenants with the committee.


Arua city lawyer (in coat) trying to control the situation as the room turned chaotic

The new tenants under their union Arua Taxi Park New Tenants Union (ANTU) alleged that the time for the old tenants to meet the committee had elapsed and it was their time to meet the committee.

After the successful eviction of the old tenants, Mr. Iddi Yassin the chairperson of the Arua Taxi Park New Traders Union, ANTU, while meeting the committee blamed the old tenants of corruption and exploitation of citizens over government property. “These people have assumed to be landlords, yet they are not. They have been corrupting the taxi park for the last four years; they have been taking money from people without giving them receipts.

Currently the power in the taxi which was sub contracted to an individual who also happens to be a landlord is not there, for almost three months the power is not there and it is in darkness and people are paying rent. Our target here is now to remove those people, we want our landlord to be directly the government. The move we have started here is a new move and nobody shall never and never evict us from there”. Yassin said.

But Ndebua Nobert one of the old tenants admitted the complaints of the new tenants but blamed the city council for all these mess. “The lower rooms we are giving them 700,000shs and then we pay to the city 350,000shs and the upper ones we pay 150,000shs and we give to them at 250,000shs. Unless the city authority and the division council resolve their problems, then they will declare who is the real tenant of the rooms because it has become chaotic,” said Ndebua.

 
Ndebua Nobert speaking to journalists after they were evicted from the council hall

Meanwhile Hon. Osuga Rasul the Arua central division speaker assured the new tenants, ANTU, of their support as council.
“No one in the name of a landlord will come and evict a businessman who is working there. These are the people who are giving council money, these are the people from whom we get revenues so anybody who thinks he has the powers to come and evict that we can’t allow and as the speaker I will not allow,” Hon. Osuga assured.

 
File Photo: Hon. Osuga Rasul speaking to journalists recently

Construction of the Arua taxi park was funded by the World Bank under the Uganda Support to Municipal Infrastructural Development-USMID at a cost of over 8 billion and has 76 parking spaces for vehicles, 125 lockups, a restaurant, 15 stance toilets, a supermarket and waiting shade for travellers.

COVER PHOTO: The old tenants quitting the hall as the new tenant’s takeover By Morish Dramadri