“Policemen only protect you temporarily, but the union is always there.” This is the slogan that Ahmed Hussein, the head of the Hawkers Union – established last September – and his founding colleagues have been using to convince other hawkers to join.  Street peddlers have survived without the protection of another party and for many years before the revolution, they used to stand in places designated by policemen and paid them a percentage of their income, while suffering some nominal campaigns performed by facilities police in demonstration of adherence to the law.

“Policemen only protect you temporarily, but the union is always there.” This is the slogan that Ahmed Hussein, the head of the Hawkers Union – established last September – and his founding colleagues have been using to convince other hawkers to join.  Street peddlers have survived without the protection of another party and for many years before the revolution, they used to stand in places designated by policemen and paid them a percentage of their income, while suffering some nominal campaigns performed by facilities police in demonstration of adherence to the law. However, founders of the union believe that fair enforcement of the law benefits all. The union seeks to allocate designated places for the hucksters that do not trespass walkways and preserve the civilized status of Cairo as well as other cities. In addition, such implementation preserves hawkers’ income without having to share an agreed upon ratio with policemen.

Uphill battle

Hussein and his colleagues at the union’s council, namely Spokesman Tarek Fouad and Head of Education Committee Rabeh Ramadan, admit the fact that their mission is hard on several levels, but they are determined to move forward. The revolution affected their mission earlier due to the curfew, but they can now benefit from the changed public stance toward the police.

Fouad said policemen requesting bribes have not changed much, but they had less control over the streets compared to the case before January 25, 2012.

Hussein said a considerable percentage of hucksters were still convinced that policemen were their best protectors.

“Not all think alike,” said Ramadan, whose committee’s task is to communicate with packmen to convince them that unionization is better for all parties in the long run. “We will stay on the street, but we will be organized,” said the union founders to their colleagues whose number has amounted to more than 7,000 members.

Code of ethics

This number will reach 10,000 by the end of next month, but they still have a long way to go, according to Fouad. Their assembly on the sidewalk in the Issaaf area, in downtown Cairo, aims to gain the largest number of members in the fastest time to form a real lobby that changes the negative attitude against pitchmen who are in fact salesmen, who do not work in a shop with a commercial register. Hussein said hawkers’ reputations deteriorated and they were seeking to save it through a code of ethics to be signed by the members who would pay no annual subscription, apart from a 10-pound (US $1.50) membership card fee. Members will start paying contributions when they feel that the union actually represents them.

According to Hussein, the real starting point is the small market project at Ramses Square—near Azbakiyah and Lammoun Bridge adjacent to the train station—an area that accommodates more than 2,000 peddlers. Negotiations are underway with Minister of Local Development Muhammad Ali Bishr and Cairo Governor Osama Kamal, to finalize models of outlets to be distributed among licensed peddlers by seniority from oldest to relatively new and then those who joined them after the revolution. According to their statistics, the number of hucksters who have joined the market since the revolution is at least one million, who were abandoned by their companies due to the economic recession, along with six million already working in the streets before the revolution.

Facing difficulties

The union does not accept sellers of firecrackers or ex-convicts unless they have proved to having “repented.” Nevertheless, there is a third category beyond their control, which is that of those who falsely joined the pitchmen near the Tahrir sit-in and performed specific roles in times of crisis, and packmen of Talaat Harb Street, who have damaged the image of the rest of their colleagues. According to Hussein, the number of permanent hawkers at Talaat Harb before the revolution was only 128 while those who monopolize the street now represent owners of companies and major distribution outlets, who decided to take advantage of lax police who disturb the efforts of the union to regulate the hawkers. The union demands that the police do not impose paying bribes by peddlers, not to use them in the police battles against demonstrators, and to resist those who cut the streets downtown on the pretext of earning a living.