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Local Government ministry urges big number of vendors to get vaccinated

There is a large number of unvaccinated vendors in some markets in the country.

And the Ministry of Local Government has again urged those vendors to get their first dose and be compliant with the requirements under the national law.

The ministry has identified the markets with a high number of unvaccinated vendors – Lautoka, Labasa, Nadi, Ba, Nausori and Laqere markets.

According to the ministry:

  • 200 vendors in Lautoka are not vaccinated – 72 are permanent and 128 casual vendors
  • 122 permanent vendors and 15 casual vendors not vaccinated in Labasa
  • 46 permanent vendors in Nadi not vaccinated
  • 35 unvaccinated vendors at the Laqere market, and
  • 542 unvaccinated vendors in Nausori.

Local Government Minister Premila Kumar said as of this week, there had been some progress in the vaccination of vendors.

She said the number of unvaccinated vendors dropped from 32 per cent to 25.6 per cent, which means 1320 vendors still have not been vaccinated, compared to 1599 last week.

Consequently, these vendors have been denied entry in accordance with the Health and Safety at Work (General Workplace Conditions) (Amendment) Regulations 2021.

“The ministry is pleased to see that more market vendors are now willing to get vaccinated,” Ms Kumar said.

“There has been resistance by some vendors initially, however, after conducting vigorous awareness, more vendors are now getting vaccinated.

“Some market vendors tried to beat the system and produced fake vaccination cards. These vendors have been warned and advised of the consequences of such actions.”

Since the recent announcement of the ‘No Jab No Job’ policy, 3829 (74 per cent) of market vendors in the municipal markets have taken their first dose of vaccination and approximately 21 per cent have taken their second dose.

Four municipal markets – Lami, Sigatoka, Valelevu and Korovou – have achieved a 100 per cent first dose vaccination rate for all its permanent market vendors; and casual vendors in Savusavu, Tavua, Rakiraki, Sigatoka and Korovou have also received 100 per cent first dose of vaccination.