Govt urged to take steps to reopen shops, small businesses

CHATTOGRAM, May 06: Businesses in Chattogram region, including small traders and shop owners who are passing a hard time due to lockdown caused by coronavirus outbreak, have urged the government to allow them reopen their establishments during the Ramadan.
They have promised to run their businesses fully complying with the government's health directives if the authorities allow them to restart their trades.
The shop owners and small traders said they have conveyed their request to the ministry concerned and the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) through the Chattogram Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI).
In a letter to the CCCI, they said hundreds of thousand of shopkeepers and small traders in greater Chattogram, including Cox's Bazar district and Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT), have kept their businesses shut for more than five weeks following the government's order in order to check the spread of COVID-19 in the region.
As their businesses are shut, they can't earn money for the last 37 days and at one stage, savings of many have emptied. They said many of them cound not earn a signle furthing to buy food for their livelihood in the last couple of weeks, read the letter.
Now, the situation has reached an extreme stage that many traders, especially the small ones and their families, are passing their days half fed or unfed.
In this situation, they gave a clarion call to the apex chamber body and local trade organisations to send a letter to the government urging it to take immediate steps to permit them reopen their businesses, at least in the remaining part of the Ramadan.
Signatories to the letter included leaders of local trade bodies including Chattogram district branch of the Bangladesh Shop Owners' Association, shop owners associations of Chattogram's main markets, Teribazar Merchants Association, Chattogram chapter of Bangladesh Jewellers' Association, Jahur Hawker Market Merchants' Association, shop owners of Reajuddin Bazar and a platform of the hawkers of porty city's makeshift markets.
Acknowledging receipt of a letter from the shop owners and small traders, CCCI President Mahbubul Alam told the FE that the local business associations and trade body leaders handed over a letter to him requesting the authorities to take urgent steps for opening shops and small businesses for during the Ramadan month as Eid is their peak season for income. He said the CCCI has already put the matter to the FBCCI at a recent meeting and not only that it also sent a letter to the ministry concerned in this regard. "I hope the concerned authorities, including the FBCCI and the ministry will take a positive decision in this regard considering the sufferings of the businessmen," he added.
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