Problems with Garden City Building Material Market, Port Harcourt

The Garden City Building Material Market (GCB­MM) in Port Harcourt is troubled with high cost of shop rent, dwindling rate of nation’s cur­rency, the Naira to foreign curren­cy; low turn out of customers’ pa­tronage, non-compliance by some of the traders who are not mem­bers of the association and above all, lack of space to accommo­date the apprentices that gradu­ate yearly from their masters and some traders who relocated from the insurgence prone states in Ni­geria to the city of Port Harcourt to join the building materials trade.

The Garden City Building Ma­terials Market is a unified building market in the city of Port Harcourt that annexed all kinds of building materials. It is located along the Abuja bye pass, the Rivers Uni­versity of Science Technology junction--Ikwerre Road and Ada George Road, all at Mile 3 vicini­ty in Diobu area of Port Harcourt City Local Government Area.
The Chairman of the Garden City Building Material Dealers Association, Mr.Calistus Nnadi­ka told The AUTHORITY that most of the problems the union is encountering is as result of the market which is not in the govern­ment allocated and gazetted area.
He said some individual land Lords in the market indiscrimi­nately increase their rents in a shop of 20 by 23 meters to the tune of N1,500, 000.00 per annum. And because the number of traders who are in search of shops are very many. The scarcity of shops in the market has resulted for the rush to any available shop, which economics reasoning will raise the prices of the rent of the shops
“One of the major challenges the union is having is none availa­bility of shops in the market which has resulted to the astronomical increase of rent by the individual land Lords who see it as gold mine. They persistently increase the rent of the their shops because there are already traders who want to take over the shops if the present occu­pant is not ready pay. In fact a shop of about 20 by 25 meters shop cost not less than N1.5 million per an­num.
“And it affects the cost of the goods we are selling in this mar­ket, because the number of shops are very limited compared to the numerous number of the influx of people from the North that wants to join the trade, and the number of apprentices that are graduating from their masters on yearly ba­sis. It make the shops in the market to be a hot cake. Traders scramble for any available shop” the Chair­man stressed.
The immediate past Chair­man of the association, Comrade Emeka Onyekwum, in an inter­view with The AUTHORITY observed that most of the goods sold in the market were all import­ed either from China or Europe. He said that the dwindling value of the Naira has contributed to the instability of prices of the goods in the market. Most of the importers in this market has suspended im­portation till further notice be­cause of the fluctuation of the ex­change rate of the Naira with other foreign currencies.
Comrade Emeka Onyekwum said that the cost of goods in the market to a large extent reflects the current value of Naira to oth­er international currencies, adding that most of the traders who im­port from China and Europe have suspended importation.
“The traders here that imports directly from China and Europe have suspended importation till further notice. If not that some Ce­ramics industries in this country are functioning, there would have been scarcity of Ceramics prod­ucts which is the major item sold in this market”, he said.
The trunk “A” road of Ikwerre and Ada-Gorge roads are part of the market that are sometimes blocked by traffic as a result of the activities in the market. This oc­curs when heavy truck vehicles are either off loading goods from containers or are loading goods bought from the market by their customers.
However, the immediate past Chairman of the Garden City Building Material Market, ex­plained that their activities does not course traffic hold-up. Ac­cording to him the association is in collaboration with the Divi­sional Police Station in the area and the union has taskforce that controls the traffic hold-up along the roads to ease traffic congestion in and around the market.
In a chat with The AUTHOR­ITY, one of the traders in the mar­ket, Mr Christian Amanze, said that there is no cash in the nation’s economy and this has affected the purchasing and selling of goods in the market. He also lamented over the high cost of renting a shop of two rooms at the cost of N700, 000.00 per annum.
What he described as “bad market” in their market parlance was as result of government pol­icies and multi-national compa­nies which are no longer awarded building contracts and construc­tion works. According to him the Traders depend on the few indi­viduals that are building their per­sonal houses, which he said does not span to make bulk purchase of their goods. He said it is when gov­ernment or multi national compa­nies award contracts that the Trad­ers will make quantum sales.
“There is hardship now, and the cost of rent here is very high. Government and big companies does not award contracts again, there is no cash in the system, and it is only when government awards contract that we can sale large quantity of goods”
“Because we have individu­als as our land lords, a shop of two rooms costs as much as N700,000 per annum. At the end of the year, all what we struggle for will all go for shop rent, it is really sad” Mr. Christian stated.
Also, one of the customers in the market, Engr. Samuel Ibe, a building contractor said that it is not just the high cost of the build­ing materials. but instabilities and inconsistencies in the prices. This, according to him, has created big problem in their profession citing that before the approval of the quotations they gave to their cli­ents while applying for a job, the prices of the materials would have changed to higher prices.This, ac­cording to him , has wildly affect­ed their job.
“You come to this market to get prices to bid for a job but in less than one month, the price will increase. As a contractor you will find yourself at a cross road. You again apply for variations. Most times our clients see us being du­bious minded, but its not so.
“Please, my brother help us to inform the government to urgent­ly do something about this situa­tion before we are sidelined out of business, because the impact is al­ready being felt on us” , Engr. Ibe lamented.
Investigations by The AU­THORITY revealed that despite the high cost of rent in the mar­ket, there are no deliberate efforts to built public conveniences by the land Lords. Their Tenants and their customers are on their own when called by nature.z
The association has no intra union problems, but is faced with lack of membership by some trad­ers who maintained that they will not associate themselves with the union. They have shown high lev­el of nonchallant attitude and none compliance with the standing or­ders of the association. This, the Chairman attributed to the free­dom of association as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution.
He said that if the government will live up to its promises by allo­cating some plots of land to their association it will solve most of these problems, and they will re­locate to a permanent place. He said with this, the city will be de­congested and more shops will be built at a cheaper rate, more trad­ers will be attracted and accom­modated in the market and it will create more jobs to the people and more Internally Generated Reve­nue to the government of the state.
“ By the grace of God, the un­ion has no intra association prob­lems, the problem we have is non-members of the association in our midst. There is freedom of associa­tion as enshrined in Nigerian con­stitution, nobody can be forced to be member of association. The few problems we have is from none members.
“We are expressly keying into Governor Nyesom Wike’s plans to decongest the Port Harcourt City. We were with the commissioner for Urban development and phys­ical planning Hon. Chinyere Igwe. He promised that something will be done in that direction
“If the government allocates a permanent site for us, its going to solve a lot of problems within and outside the market. The site will be exclusively for members of the association to checkmate and monitor the activities of the trad­ers and non-members of the asso­ciation . There will be more num­ber of shops to accommodate more traders.
“The shops’ rent will be dras­tically reduced. It will even go along way to reduce the high cost of goods we are selling in this mar­ket, because we add the high cost of the shops’ rent to the prices of the goods we sale in this market. There will be more jobs for the people. And above all, the Inter­nally Generated Revenue (IGR) of the state will be enhanced” the Chairman further Stressed.
On the security situation in the market, Mr. Nnadika said that the association has taskforce on ground to control any act of vio­lence amongst the members, add­ing that the association is working in conjunction with the Divisional Police Station at Nkpuolu to tackle any hoodlums that may create acts capable of causing public disorder.
“We have strong Taskforce with uniform and identity cards to enforce internal sanity in this market that operates in conjunc­tion with the Nkpolu Divisional Police Station to tackle any exter­nal force that miay arise. Though, we have not experienced anything like that, God has been in charge of our security situation in this mar­ket”, he said.
The market according to the Mr. Nnadika has not experienced any fire outbreak because of the measures the association intro­duced. According to him, “The Union introduced a self help measure to checkmate fire out­break within the market.” He said the association made it mandatory for every member to install fire ex­tinguisher in his or her shop, add­ing that so far, this has been work­ing for the traders.