Pretoria - It was smiles and jubilation all round when the traders at Denneboom station in Mamelodi and the City of Tshwane reached an agreement on the future of the more than 600 informal traders while a new multi-million mall is being built on the spot where they are trading.
The traders, with the help of Lawyers for Human Rights, turned to the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, for the second time in a week to firstly obtain an order against Isibonelo Property Services, the developers of the R850 million mall.
The court last week issued an urgent order provisionally interdicting the developers from demolishing the structure from which the traders had been trading since the 1970s.
They again turned to court yesterday to force the City to reconnect the water supply to the building from which they are trading, as well as to repave the area in front of the building. These issues became moot once the parties agreed to engage with each other in future.
The big issue was that neither the City, nor the developer, ever engaged with them about their future once the mall was built. The traders also wanted to know what would happen to them once the new mall wais in place, said Mary Chomo, one of the informal traders.
The parties reached an agreement yesterday, which was made an order of court, in terms of which the City and the developers had to first engage with the traders before temporarily moving them.
A temporary area was earmarked from where the traders will ply their business, pending the construction of the mall.
Commuters from the Denneboom station will be diverted to public transport facilities which will run via the temporary trading area. The traders will also be provided with containers in which to keep their wares. They will also be kept up to date regarding the design of the new building and trading space for them once construction had been concluded.
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The traders’ biggest fear was that they were going to be moved to an area which the train commuters did not frequent and that no provision was going to be made for them once the new mall was completed.
Chomo said they were dependent on the thousands of commuters which daily made use of the station. They have been selling their wares for decades from a permanent structure erected for them at the station by the former city council.
This income is their only source of livelihood. “The money we earn here has seen our children going to school and even university,” said Chomo.
Some of the traders had been trading there since the 1960s - even before a permanent structure had been erected for them.
Another trader, Anna Thipe, said she had been selling fruit and vegetables at the Denneboom station since 1972 and this was her and her family’s only source of income.
Denneboom train station is one of two stations in Mamelodi which serves about 20000 people a day who frequent the area.
According to the traders, they have for some time now heard about the new mall which was coming.
They had also seen plenty activity in the area since the beginning of the year, including the demolition of pavement in front of the
undercover area where they were trading.