Citizens receive Ramadan with expired commodities [Archives:2008/1188/Opinion]
Najeeb Al-Ghurbani
All the farmers and laborers are extremely engaged in how to provide bread for their families while the government and opposition is very busy in constitutional amendments and useless speeches. Both the government and opposition made us in trouble while Friday remains the same Friday and the sermon remains the same sermon. This implies that there is nothing new in their speeches, dialogues or negotiations.
Suddenly without any indicators, Ramadan, the Holy Month of worship and purification, came. And because the government is unable to do anything in Ramadan or throughout the year with regard to fighting the phenomenon of price hikes, created by irresponsible tradesmen, who never consider exaltedness of the holy month, the local markets have become flooded with expired foodstuffs and other commodities.
I would like to inform you that one day I went to a pharmacy to buy a Cerelak milk for my baby girl, but I was shocked to find out that this commodity is not available. In the street, I found that large quantities of expired commodities are being sold by vendors. I also noticed that vendors are selling various kinds of commodities such as honey, milk and dates.
The local markets are excessively flooded with expired foodstuffs while citizens, who are seemingly suffering from malnutrition, anemia and severe poverty, rush to purchase a lot of such expired commodities merchandized by vendors. Those rushing to buy from these expired goods are either limited income citizens, farmers, laborers or marginalized people whose living standards deteriorated due poor policies exercised by the government that only encourage corruption to become rampant and poverty to become severer.
I remained perplexed asking myself, “Where are the oversight authorities and agencies concerned with product specifications and quality control, as well as the Consumer Protection Authority? No one of these parties monitor expired commodities sold by vendors in streets of the capital city and other main cities nationwide.
It is not acceptable, if not taboo, for citizens to receive Ramadan with expired or faked commodities. Why the good government doesn't realize the risky diseases suffered by citizens from day to day. The Yemeni citizens consume trafficked pesticides and cancerous substances, which have remained in stores until becoming unusable.
Shame on our government:
The Yemeni popular markets turned to be a landfill for waste disposal, specifically as goods merchandized in such markets contravenes even the simplest international specifications followed in the other world countries. The neighboring states don't justify what happens in Yemen's local markets where the government approves the mechanism of free market while vendors exploit this concept to replace free trade by free chaos.
Street vendors also exploit the government's being unable to arrest or question any tradesmen, who have been already charged with monopolizing goods or trafficking them illegally into our homeland. They also exploit poor awareness on the part of citizens, who never check the dates of production and expiry on cans or boxes of products. The government doesn't feel ashamed to say that it has many oversight committees to monitor foodstuffs in local markets. The government doesn't feel ashamed that it has no specific laws to govern the process of exporting foreign products into the country.
It is extremely ridiculous to see that citizens are living in a territory without law and order, particularly as their own government cares about sponsoring irresponsible tradesmen who create multiple crises with negative impacts on citizens' living conditions.
The shame is on a government that proved unable to monitor and control what is taking place in the local markets. The ordinary citizen has become a victim of his government. Ramadan Karim and acceptable fasting for the ordinary citizen! In order to be healthier, the government should fast by refraining from corruption and stop embezzling public funds.
Source: Al-Tagheer.com
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