By DANA SMITH

Tribune Staff Reporter

dsmith@tribunemedia.net

THE government’s call for Potters Cay and Arawak Cay vendors to pay rent or face a shut-down has met with mixed reaction – some vendors calling it “bullying” and others praising the government for being firm.

On Tuesday, Agriculture Minister Alfred Gray announced that several hundred vendors and their associations met with the government to agree on a monthly payment scheme to settle arrears.

Officials have asked vendors to pay either $100 or $200. The minister said records show some vendors have arrears amounting to $30,000 or $40,000, accumulated over several years.

“I am told that some vendors are belligerent,” he said. “They are refusing to accept that proposal. And unless the Cabinet of the Bahamas stops me, I am going to ensure that those who have no leases are not licensed.

“If they have no license to operate, I am going to ask the police to close them down.”

Arawak Cay vendor Michelle Anderson called the government unfair in their stance as some vendors simply cannot afford to pay their arrears.

“You can’t bully the people – you’re supposed to put the people first.

“You don’t know why these people wasn’t paying,” she said. “Some days I don’t even make a salad. If I make $100 a week that’s plenty.

“They don’t know the reason why people wasn’t paying - $200 isn’t bad, but you can’t expect for everybody to pay because some people business are bigger and have more clientele than others.”

Ms Anderson also claimed the government should not have made the extent of some vendors’ arrears public, as this is bad for business.

“If you got to the public and let them know, ‘Hey, these people owe so much money,’ you making it bad for the people of Arawak Cay to make money to pay,” she said.

“The first thing the people say is, ‘Why should I go out there and spend my money and they ain’t paying the government?’ It’s not right. It’s not fair.”

Another vendor who did not want to give his name had a similar stance.

“What about people who can’t pay?” he asked. “They just can’t kick people out.”

On the other hand, Potter’s Cay vendor Michael Davis said the government “has a right to do what they have to do”.

“Potter’s Cay Dock as well as Arawak Cay should agree to pay what they agree to pay so that we can have a better atmosphere to work in to make this Bahamas a better place,” he said. “(The arrears) should be paid.”

A nearby patron also voiced her support of the government’s position, stating: “They need to pay their old bill that they owe. These vendors is make more than $100 a day and they’re asking them for $100 a month. They lousy. I have to pay mine (taxes), so they need to pay. I have a problem with that.”

One vendor, speaking on the condition of anonymity, questioned how the government allowed the vendors to avoid paying their due long enough to accumulate thousands of dollars in arrears.

“I don’t understand how the bills got so high,” she said. “Sounds like some kind of lack in the government because if they were doing their job it shouldn’t have gone as high as it is.”

However, she added: “Everybody makes enough money to pay their bills. If you making the money but you decide to spend the money somewhere else instead of paying your bill, then that’s your fault.

“My stall don’t be crowded but I can pay my bill with what I get. The people that owes the most money is the ones who have the most people at their stalls so why can’t they pay? Until (the government) gets firm on these people and say, ‘If you don’t do it, then your stall gone get take’, they wont pay, so that’s what they have to do.”