TACLOBAN CITY – Nearly a hundred members of the newly-formed United Sidewalk Vendors’ Association of Tacloban (USVAT) signed their signatures yesterday petitioning the Sangguniang Panglungsod of Tacloban “to conduct a public hearing at the most immediate time with the end goal of passing a new ordinance beneficial to both parties.”

According to Jaime Biron Polo, president of a non-government organization called Institute for Samar and Leyte Engagements (ISLES), the group backing up USVAT, this is to formalize the plea of the sidewalk vendors to bring them back to the “wall side.”

It was learned form Polo that the Sangguniang Panglungsod here had initially confirmed that they will look into this matter.

“That’s why were here because we want that by next session the sanggunian would give time for a public hearing regarding the ordinance concerning the sidewalk vendors,” Polo said.

“During the ratification and signing of the petition for a public hearing, ISLES and the sidewalk vendors have agreed that they will do whatever is beneficial to all the concerned parties.

The sidewalk vendors also believe that through this petition they have already attained initial success because all of them have agreed to follow some self-made by-laws that would convince the city to make a new ordinance concerning them.

To recall, the city government implemented an ordinance that ordered the sidewalk vendors to transfer from the streets on to the second floor of the new North wing of the supermarket starting last Jan. 4.

But Polo told Express that the sidewalk vendors want to bring them back to amend or to make another ordinance that would cater the sidewalk vendors.

According to the sidewalk vendors themselves, since compliance of the relocation order their sales and income drastically dropped, and in fact, most of them consistently had no sales each day since no costumers/buyers would go up to the designated relocation site.

“Because of the very low if not no sales each day, we are always to compel to peddle our goods around the city,” the vendors said.

But, in recent days, this activity has resulted to the arrest of some vendors as they are regarded as ambulant vendors. The vendors also claimed that some of them are even subjected to all forms of harassment and violent scuffles .