DEAR EDITOR, the first thing that caught my attention after buying a copy of Island Sun (issue 2492) yesterday morning, is the above footage of a picture on your cover page.

Nothing has insulted me so early than that statement.

I said to myself, “oh my God, after all these years, is this the best the councillors and their administrators can do?”

I quickly flicked over the pages and was again disappointed to note in the actual article, ‘Central market still a problem’ that the council is still proposing to build mini markets outside of the city.

Proposing for what time?

Till Noah comes back?

As a citizen of this city, I am sick and tired of hearing and reading about this proposal for over ten years now.

Do not print anymore about it, until after a ground-breaking ceremony has taken place.

Councillors, it is hard to believe that after all these years, you are still finding it difficult to acquire land or even turning the central market building into a 2-storey building.

All these excuses are signs of a weak administration and councillors who are not innovative.

If land is the number one problem as the market master and his bosses would like us to believe, then I have two proposals as medium and short term measures.

First, the Council to quickly purchase that piece of land between the main and old bridges in the centre of the city Bodo Dettke is now selling – at whatever the cost.

That space is just as big as the Central Market area and acquiring it now for a new market, provides for a medium term solution.

It would be after a decade or two down the track, before the city would need another market area.

My above proposal is not impossible to achieve, hence I am challenging the Lord Mayor and his councillors to seriously consider it. You have all the financial sources and expertise at your finger-tips. All you need to do is, get down and do it now than later.

This is not to suggest that the proposal to build a market at each end of the city should be dropped. No, not at all.

The Council must still vigorously pursue that proposal because the city population is increasing at an alarming rate.

This is where the council needs to work closely with Guadalcanal province, both to acquire land and also in joint-financing of the project.

How about trying out crowd funding where our fifty members of parliament should be willing to throw in some money?

They have millions in your pockets and I am sure they will be willing to help.

Second, sellers of second-hand and locally tailored clothing must be relocated quickly to an arts centre to ply their art.

That would be the cultural arts centre or some other shopping areas within the city.

The council must not accept clothes as a market produce. So sell it somewhere else. Not at the central market. This proposal is a short term solution to overcrowding.

Get real and give us a better market news next time. Not the same old story.

 

MARTIN MATA

HONIARA