The new multibillion-government highway market in Lukaya town council, Kalungu district has been converted into a bar, three years after its construction.
The market worth 3.75 billion shillings, was constructed with funds from the Ministry of Works and Transport and Lake Victoria Environment Management Project-LAVEMP, to be utilized by hundreds of roadside vendors operating in Lukaya town council, along the Kampala-Masaka highway.
Many stalls in the new market have been converted to operate as a bar as an alternative after the vendors declined to occupy it citing poor structural design.
Last month, authorities in Lukaya town council handed over the market to a local businessman Ismail Kafeero Madugu, to use the facility for private businesses, from which he will pay rent to the local government.
Kafeero indicates that he has decided to turn part of the market into a bar, as a viable investment that can attract customers to the facility that had been left to waste.
According to him, the new market is poorly located almost at the edge of Lukaya town council in the Lwera area, making it isolated from the main business centre of the area, something that discourages the would-be customers from going to it.
He argues that he found it reasonable to turn part of the market into a bar and an entertainment centre for leisure activities, which he says can easily attract more customers, something that will lead to boosting the structure for other businesses.
Kafeero adds that he also plans to remodel and improve the design of some of the stalls and put in place kiosks to attract more vendors to them.
He anticipates that the many revellers in the market will lure some roadside from the old private roadside market to occupy the new facility, hence increasing the local revenue collection.
Charles Tamale, the Lukaya Town Council Chairperson indicates as leaders, they convinced the private businessman to take over management of the market, as a way of putting the facility to use, rather than being left to waste.
He says that they will continuously guide the businessman to put the facility to appropriate use, especially by allowing vendors of agricultural produce to occupy some of the stalls in the market.
Tamale explains that despite the huge investment from the government, the town council was not making any revenues from the market as expected; because it has instead become a burden, which they had to offload by finding any possible way for putting the market to use.
Lawrence Lubega, one of the vendors who operates a beverage kiosk in the area indicates that the deserted market had become a hiding ground for the criminals, saying that utilizing it for any business is going to rid them of insecurity.
Lubega has challenged the government to always carry out proper feasibility studies and wide consultations with the concerned stakeholders before investing huge sums of money into public projects that later turn out to be white elephants.
