An appeal to Sarawak government to allocate funds for a new centre with complete facilities and with the relocation of the ‘Youth Night Market’ at Metrocity to a new location near the area.
Fazzrudin Abdul Rahman (GPS-Tupong) said in a press conference at the DUN yesterday that the night market established in 2016 housed 180 youth vendors and the challenge they are facing is the lack of parking spaces.
“There are vendors earning between RM400 and 500 a night while others earned RM1,200 and if we average it out: RM600 x 180 vendors x 4 days x 4 weeks= RM1,728,000 per month. The projected sales a month can reach RM2 million.
“Therefore, these sales are enough for them to generate good income for their families so they do not need to look for other areas to operate their business,” he said.
He noted that the ‘Youth Night Market’ is crucial in contributing to the income and when they started operating, a lot of the stalls are not used which has caused the owners and renters to feel uncomfortable about it.
“Hence, I appeal to the government to discuss the relocation of the market to a much better location which is not far from where they originally are,” he pointed out.
He added that they have already suggested a location and the developers are cooperating with them to control the rent of the new location but they need the support of the government to upgrade the new location for the night market business.
“There are more than 1,000 vendors who are still on the waiting list to apply for a space to sell their products.
“When the new location is ready, we will limit the number of vendors to ensure that their incomes are balanced and if there are too many vendors, the income will be low which is why we will balance it out and give chances to others,” he said.
He further disclosed that the new location will be located in an open area near the present location but they need of a large sum of money to upgrade the new location.
“We also plan to build a centre with a container like concept that is beautiful and can generate more income and can help to attract more visitors and tourists with better facilities at the new location,” he said.
He also suggested that the government upgrade the road lanes from two to four lanes from Court’s Mammoth to Malihah junction to ease traffic congestion at the roundabout in front of E-mart.
Fazzrudin als urged the government to construct roads from E-mart to Kampung Paroh and Sejijak to improve the traffic flow before the traffic problem worsen in the near future.
