President Yoweri Museveni has halted plans to reopen city arcades today Friday amidst the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
Early this week, government had cleared 48 city arcades which had fulfilled the required Standard Operating Procedures to reopen on Friday.
“Before Friday, we will declare those arcades that have met the standard operating procedures open. The other arcades that did not meet the SOPs will be re-evaluated by the team in a few days, but should be less than a week,” Trade Minister Amelia Kyambadde told arcade owners on Tuesday.
According to BBS TV, the President said that the arcades will have to wait until cabinet approves the recommendations of inspection officials from the Ministry of Health and Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) who are responsible for clearing the business facilities.
Museveni in March, 2020 suspended among others; arcade operations as one of the ways of controlling the spread of covid-19.
During his state of the nation address on covid-19 in June, the President said arcades would remain closed until they are cleared by the Ministry of Health and other Covid-19 response teams to reopen again.
“Arcades should remain closed but the covid-19 taskforce together with KCCA and Ministry of Health should select some arcades to pilot safety measures before opening all of them,” Museveni noted.
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