Downtown Guadalajara has never looked so serene for a long time. As night began to fall on Tuesday, an uncanny hush had descended over el Centro’s plazas, pedestrian precincts and sidewalks. The eerie stillness prevailed wherever you looked: the quaint gardens outside the San Francisco and Aranzazu churches; the Liberacion, Tapatia, Fundadores, Universidad and Guadalajara plazas; the Zaragoza, Ramon Corona, Pedro Loza and Morelos walkways.
The scene in downtown Guadalajara Wednesday.
Thanks to the intervention of almost 1,000 city officials, employees and police officers divided into 37 teams, Mayor Enrique Alfaro had carried out his promise and successfully banished hundreds of ambulant vendors from their places of work.
Although the evictions had been previously announced and steps taken to provide the traders with alternative spaces or jobs, Guadalajara authorities had feared trouble. In the days leading up to the operation, angry vendors staged protests outside city hall, some chaining themselves in a line to draw greater attention to what they called the “aggressive tactics” of the newly installed mayor and his team. Leaders of the vendors had vowed to fight “tooth and nail” to defend their work spaces.
As it transpired, Tuesday’s smoothly run operation went off without incident and most of the traders meekly packed up their merchandize and left without undue fuss.
“When have we ever seen the city center looking so clean and ordered?” a triumphant Alfaro tweeted later that evening. His target of cleaning up the downtown area had been ratified a day earlier by the city council, which voted unanimously in favor of a new regulation – going by the elaborate title Funcionamiento de Giros Comerciales y el de Imagen Urbana – that revoked all previous permits issued to vendors, set up new rules for street traders and gave the green light for Tuesday’s evictions.
The mayor’s next task will be to ensure the traders don’t begin to creep back to their former spaces. Past administrations that have tried similar experiments usually failed because overworked city inspectors were unable to police the downtown zone effectively and were too easily drawn into accepting bribes.
Some vendors took desperate measures to make their feelings known.
Dozens of police officers prowled the city center Wednesday to make sure their hard work the day before had not been in vain, while city workers dressed in distinctive T-shirts attacked the considerable mess left behind with brooms, brushes, paint and other cleaning utensils.
Many of the displaced vendors have already taken up city hall’s promise to find them spaces in other markets, and the original cohesion of the traders’ group appears to be fragmenting. Guadalajara Family Development Agency (DIF) President Lorena Martinez said all the senior citizens who have lost their traditional places of work would receive assistance from her staff.
The new city regulations include the setting up of a fund to help the vendors make the transition to a new way of life.
Alfaro’s plan includes a concession for a certain number of vendors to remain in the city center in spaces as yet to be determined. They will, however, be restricted to selling merchandize from a list of 15 items that cannot include fayuca, or contraband. Any vendor who breaches the rules will have their license suspended immediately. In addition, city hall is prepared to allow some indigenous vendors to sell hand-crafted items in designated spaces but they will have to prove residence in Guadalajara.
The new regulations permit the setting up of promotional fairs and temporary exhibits in plazas, as well as registered vendors on public holidays.
Tuesday’s operation only affected vendors working in a small area around the four central plazas that surround the Cathedral, Degollado Theater and Government Palace. Vendors plying their trade outside the San Juan de Dios or Libertad Market or along the cluttered Avenida Obregon were not bothered by police or municipal officials. Alfaro has indicated these vendors will be the next targets and hopes to have them removed before the start of the holiday season.
That may be easier said than done. The San Juan de Dios and Obregon merchants have a history of standing their ground, and a willingness to use violence if required. With Christmas approaching, they are unlikely to be as compliant as their fellow vendors were this week.