Shutter down: Traders rue Lahore shut down losses

City govt claims most markets were open throughout the day.

LAHORE: “We are already facing losses. First the energy crisis and now political unrest,” Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Ijaz A Mumtaz said on Monday. Such political activities have taken a toll on small and medium businesses in the city, he said.

Shops and business centres on The Mall, Hall Road, Shah Alam Market, Circular Road, Ravi Road, Multan Road, Ferozepur Road, Shalimar Link Road, GT Road, Shahdara Chowk, Liberty Market, MM Alam Road and Urdu Bazaar were mostly shut during the day and business in other areas remained slow.

The city government, however, claimed that most markets in the city were open throughout the day.

Muhammad Ahmed, a shopkeeper at Anarkali Bazaar, said most of the shops there had shuttered down for the day to avoid a situation like the one during PTI’s protest in Faisalabad. He said he had no political affiliation but was simply scared of mob violence. “What if they turned unruly and started looting shops,” Ahmed said.

Faizan Naseer, an employee at a shop at Anarkali Bazaar, wrote a letter addressed to the protest organisers at GPO Chowk. The note, written on the letterhead of a popular fashion house, said that several of the employees at the market had wanted to join the protest demonstration at GPO Chowk, but their employers had threatened them with dire consequences if they abandoned the shops. In his letter, Naseer asked the PTI to force the shops to shutter down for the day.  A few scuffles between traders and PTI workers were reported from Hall Road, Beadon Road and Shah Alam. PTI workers had apparently tried to force the shopkeepers to close business for the day.

“Traders are non-political... our priority is to look after our business and employees, most of whom are daily wage workers. Such calls are a cause of concern for us,” Humayun Iqbal, a wholesale trader said.

All Pakistan Textile Mills Association chairman SM Tanveer, Pakistan Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry Lahore’s Zonal chairman SM Naseer, Lahore Chamber’s former SVP Abdul Basit and APTMA leader Waleed Sehgal issued statements against the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf on Monday. They said that Imran Khan was trying to damage the economy while Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif wanted prosperity.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 16^th, 2014.