Coronavirus:

B’da city mayor, Paul Achombong talks with the press

B’da City Mayor Suspends Market Rents, Tolls
By Doh Bertrand Nua in Yaounde
Traders in Markets in Bamenda have been exonerated from paying market tolls and other incidental taxes for a period of two months. This is in a bid to accompany them to adhere to the measures prescribed by the government to prevent the spread of the coronavirus in the country.
    The decision was announced recently by the City Mayor of Bamenda, Paul Achobong Tambeng, as he went out sensitizing the population on the incidence of the virus, and measures prescribed by government to check its spread in the country.
  
    Business persons operating at the Bamenda main market, the Nkwen Market, Ntarikon Market and the Food Market are those to benefit the mayor’s largesse. 
    The Mayor said traders who have already paid their rents for the period concerned will equally be looked into so that everybody benefits equally.
    “The petty traders who come to sell one thing or the other and pay 100 frs will equally be exempted from paying that amount for a period of two months,” Achobong instructed.
    He enjoined traders and business persons to observe proper hygiene around their vicinities in order to remain safe from the deadly virus. He prescribed respect for basic hygiene rules to all traders and their customers as recommended by the World Health Orgnisation and the government so as to prevent the markets from becoming breeding grounds for the virus. 
    In yet another outing, Achobong outlined additional measures to be observed by Bamenda inhabitants in public places as a means to bar the virus infesting the region. 
    The Mayor, who puts the wellbeing of his population at the top of his agenda, has made hand washing around all markets and public places compulsory.
    The Covid-19 measures only add to the city council’s operation clean city campaign which has witnessed the clearing of garbage from all major quarters in Bamenda. 

    The Clean City campaign is coordinated by the City Council in collaboration with the NGO, Women in Action against Gender Based Violence in Cameroon.
    Cognizant of the suffering of inhabitants of Bamenda, who have been hard hit by the repercussions of the armed conflict rocking the region, Achonbong has promised to prioritize confidence-building measures with the population if just to ensure a return to peace and normalcy this, to enable him implement his poverty alleviation and development vision.
    The Mayor plans to create new roads while maintaining existing ones; provide alternative sources of energy supply; ensure regular flow of portable water and a gradual return to night life to reinstate the lost boom in business activities.

The decision which takes effect this April is aimed to relieve traders and businesses persons of the financial burden incurred due to the economic slowdown imposed by government, and of course, the ghost towns imposed by separatists.