Court restrains council from removing stalls

THE Lae City Council has been restrained from removing market stalls in homes.
The ruling was made by the district court last Friday in favour of plaintiff, Stanley Kurem, and more than 100 mothers.
Kurem and the women, through their lawyer Emmanuel Solwai Mambei, of Solwai Lawyers, had argued that the council did not have powers to ban market stalls.
They stressed that the council had regulatory powers which meant that it should be inspecting the stalls to police their compliance to health standards.
The council had on Jan 19 issued a letter to all market stalls inside homes and on front yards in Eriku, Top Town and Market, which were selling cigarettes, betelnuts, chewing gum, soft drinks, and ice-blocks to immediately cease operations.
Some of the council’s reasons included the proliferation of betelnut spittle and the encouragement of street hawking and peddling.
The stall operators rallied and fronted up at the council headquarters at the Niall Community Centre on Jan 20.
The meeting stalled, forcing them to engage a lawyer, who happened to be the former principal legal adviser to the council.