Shop owners operating in the Accra Mall have announced that their shops will be temporarily closed in the initial working hours of today, Thursday, October 24, 2019, in protest of some difficult conditions they operate under.
A statement issued by the Accra Mall Tenants Association said the decision was taken to bring to the fore the onerous conditions under which they operate at the mall.
The decision means that the shops at the Mall will be closed today between the hours of 9 am and 1 pm.
Neglect of shopowners
The shop owners in their statement complained that the ceiling of the Mall which collapsed sometime last year affected patronage as customers were concerned about their safety.
The incident, the shop owners said, hugely affected patronage at the Mall which in turn led to a downward spiral of revenue of the Tenants.
“Despite numerous protests and engagements with the management of the mall, nothing was done to fix the ceiling until about a month ago when they began to fix the ceiling.
“In order to fix the ceiling, the management of the mall have erected scaffolding in the walkways of the whole mall despite protestations from the tenants that this would rather scare customers away,” the shop owners said.
The tenants proposed that the scaffolds be erected at the sections where work was being done and then moved to other sections of the ceiling rather than erecting the scaffolds all over the walkway of the mall.
According to the tenants, the management of the mall ignored their concerns and persisted with erecting the scaffolds with the result being that patronage to the mall has worsened leaving the tenants in a worse position.
The shop owners further complained about the exorbitant rent and the lack of promotional activities by management of the mall to improve revenue which slumped due to their negligence in maintaining the mall leading to the collapse of the ceiling.