The new hawkers' market in Louis Trichardt's CBD, between Burger and Kruger Street, has finally been completed, with several of the informal traders already having finished setting up their new stalls.
The hawkers readily agree that the new marketplace is much more business friendly now, compared to the zinc stalls they used to sell their food, fruit and vegetables from in the past. With the new stalls, they can lock up their wares inside their stalls before they leave for home at the end of the day. They also have water taps at the end of each row of stalls; before, they had to fetch water from a communal water tap next to the public toilets at the marketplace. Furthermore, the whole marketplace is now neatly paved, which looks much neater than the bare red soil, which would become muddy and messy when it rained.
According to Makhado Municipality's spokesperson, Mr Louis Bobodi, the market can accommodate about 90 hawkers. "These hawkers, however, must clean the area themselves, and rates will have to be revised as per municipal policy."
Bobodi says the police would further conduct regular patrols through the area to ensure the safety of the hawkers and their products.
Early on Thursday morning (11 May), Limpopo Mirror took a walk through the marketplace and had a chat with some of the hawkers to hear what they thought of the new setup.
Hulisani Mabasa (26), who was busy sorting and packing tomatoes at her stall, told us that she was expecting to get more customers as the marketplace now provided a bigger and cleaner environment. Mabasa has been in the business since 2021. She took over from her grandmother, who she said was now too old to run the business.
"I am very happy about the new marketplace. We even have better water facilities. Before, I could not manage to carry a 25-litre water container all the way from the taps at the communal toilets to our stall. We also used to travel back and forth with our food stuff, but now we can just lock it inside our stall and go home," said Grace Rabhuli from Madombidzha, who prepares and sells meals to customers visiting the town.
Phatheni Mushavhi, the chairperson of the hawkers' association in the Louis Trichardt CBD, said he was also happy with the new marketplace, but felt it was too small to accommodate all the hawkers. "There is only space for 60 hawkers to sell their fruit and veg produce, and 30 hawkers to sell prepared meals. Although it looks much neater, there is not enough space for everyone," he said.