By Aida Aziz
IPOH: Bazar Ramadan Rahmah at People’s Park was very quiet..no foot trafic.
That’s the right sentence to describe the atmosphere of Bazar Ramadan Rahmah (BRR) at People’s Park, here.
The bazaar is not only less visited by the public, but there is also no encouraging response among hawkers.
It is understood that there are several factors that cause this to happen, including the new location, lack of promotion and visitors who prefer large-scale Ramadan bazaars.
The BRR here is implemented in collaboration with the Ipoh City Council (MBI), the Office of the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living (KPDN) Perak and People’s Park Sdn. Bhd. (Chang Jiang Coffee).
In addition, the number of registered hawkers is 27 people.
Various responses from hawkers and visitors at BRR regarding the matter, where many of them expressed the same problem.
One of the BRR hawker, Muhammad Nazriq Hussin, 39, admitted that the response of visitors there was somewhat unsatisfactory even though it had been a week of fasting.
“It seems that people may still not know about the existence of Bazar Ramadan Rahmah which offers reasonable prices here.
“Perhaps also for the first week of Ramadan, people visit the bigger bazaar first, after the second week and so on they try to look at other bazaars in Ipoh.
“Although the site and license here are provided for free by the local authority (PBT) but we still do not get response from hawkers, many do not want to take the risk of doing business in a new location.
“If possible, we want the bazaar here not only this year, but to continue for the next year. That’s why it’s important to revitalize this location, especially to get the support of the hawkers ,” he said, who sells baked steamboats.
Meanwhile, Izzati Azhar, 25, who sells fried mihun, noodles and pastries through his family business, also shares the same view.
She said that he was a bit upset with the atmosphere of the bazaar there which was not well received, however he understood that it was normal in business.
“Previously we did business in Tapah, recently we just moved to Ipoh. Got an offer to do business in BRR.
“Over the past few days there have been fewer (visitors). If there were many a few days ago when lucky visitors were offered an additional RM20 e-Wallet value, it will be implemented here for 10 selected days only,” she said.
For one of the visitors, Raja Syedi Raja Ahmad Nasir, this is his first time visiting BRR.
“I found out that there is food with Rahmah (cheap) prices here, there is no problem with the location, but in my view it may need to be announced more widely to the public because when you pass by from the street, you can’t see the Bazaar Ramadan bunting,” he said.
Bazar Ramadan Rahmah is an initiative of KPDN to help the people to reduce the cost of living in a more effective, consistent and targeted manner.
