The majority of the Mon Repos market vendors did not resume business today following yesterday’s incident, which saw stalls being burnt, vehicles being damaged, and goods being looted.
Our team on Wednesday morning visited the market and observed a few vendors selling what they had left from yesterday’s events.
The Mon Repos market, which is usually packed with shoppers and vendors who are making a living selling goods, was empty.
What started as a peaceful protest in Golden Grove, East Coast Demerara (ECD), calling for justice for slain Quindon Bacchus, turned fiery as protestors turned to looting and burning vehicles as well as physical attacks on vendors.
A vendor told MTV News Update, “What we saw in here yesterday towards us, it wasn’t nice, and it was brutal, it was really brutal. People were beaten up, people lost millions, and vehicle broken up, bun up, and it was not nice. And the hurtful part of it, there were no police, until when everything finished then, we start to see police coming.”
The vendor continued, “Why was it started till up on the East Coast and had to reach till here at Mon Repos market and we poor people, this is not my stand, but I running this stand and we lost so much,” he said.
Another seller said that it happened so fast that all he could have done was pick up his day sales and escape the disruption.
“Yesterday, we had no chance to do nothing; all we coulda do just snatch we money bag and run, and the market was not protected yesterday when this thing was happening, and we come out here to make a daily bread hay suh.”
Another vendor told our team that it was tough for him to watch his potential earnings being carted off.
“So for that happen, and they come and [I] stand up and see they carry away your thing, wasn’t easy….This stall was packed, they take wuh them want, eat and what they ain’t want, they dump it on the road.”
He further stated, “Everybody traumatised, they wouldn’t come out. I just put out the banana, and the rest in the bus, so in case, [I’ll] just go home,” the vendor posited.
Meanwhile, Lolita expressed that she feared for her life when the protestors came to her stand.
She, however, managed to pick up a few things and escape the scene. “We ain’t really get to save nothing, but I had little stuff that I had dragged out, but a lot of things buss up, them costly things.”
During the height of the violent protest, President Irfaan Ali visited the affected vendors and assured them that they would be compensated for the losses they encountered.
