Once again, a meeting between informal and metropolitan

After an eviction, there was a confrontation that left a shopkeeper detained and an agent with four days of medical leave.

A confrontation between informal merchants and metropolitan agents generated reactions for and against the measures taken to evict street vendors in downtown Guayaquil.

In the recording it is seen how several women are on top of the uniformed men who, with the use of force and gas, try to get away from their blows, and one of them falls. The confrontation occurred at noon last Saturday, on Lorenzo de Garaycoa street, between Clemente Ballén and Aguirre.

As a result, one of the shopkeepers was arrested because she allegedly physically assaulted a metropolitan police officer and caused damage to her motorcycle. They allegedly used a knife and a stick to damage the beacon, siren, rear-view mirror, license plate holder, rudder, tracks, guide and fender of the motorcycle.

“The incident began when a member of the Guayaquil Metropolitan Control Agents Corps (Cuacme) asked informal merchants to withdraw from public roads. And they responded by throwing food and fruit that they sold and the baskets and crates where they are stored,” the statement reads.

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It is not the first incident this month. EXPRESS reported in recent days that there were attacks on two ice cream vendors. They put electricity on one and broke the head of another. About those meetings, the Cabildo does not refer anything. It does say, however, that in this new incident, agent Michael Almea was attacked by street vendors, who scratched, bit and hit him on the knee with a stone. They also damaged his helmet.

The urban planner Luis Alfonso Saltos, the problem is deep. “The eternal struggle against informality. Working to formalize the informal has always been the challenge for the municipalities, but that requires political decision and recognizing the problem at its root”, he published.

There are constant complaints from informal vendors regarding the treatment they receive from these agents. In addition to denouncing that they allegedly ask for bribes so as not to evict them.

Other users on social networks, such as Luis Lazo, regretted that this type of action is reached and invited the authorities and agents to put themselves in the place of these people who, in the absence of formal job opportunities, seek to bring bread to their homes. .

“It is nice to speak from comfort, but for many of these people, it is the only way to survive, and not seek that livelihood by stealing. We complain that crime has increased, but we don't want people to earn an honest living,” said Lazo.