By Lee Kyung-min
Four people were injured Tuesday in a clash between 100 merchants in the Noryangjin Fisheries Wholesale Market and 40 workers from the market manager, the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives (NFFC), sources said Wednesday.
This is the latest development in the 10-month-long conflict between the two over the modernization of the 49-year-old market in southern Seoul.
The clash came soon after the 40 NFFC workers entered the market premises to barricade off sections currently unoccupied with steel pipes, after 76 percent of merchants there moved to a new building next door as part of a 200 billion won relocation project, initiated by the NFFC.
The 100 merchants are among the remaining 321, or 24 percent of the total 1,334 merchants there, who refuse to relocate to the new building opened in January, citing high rent and dissatisfaction over the less-popular location.
The NFFC said the merchants are illegally occupying the site with many of them using the now-vacant sections to display their own fishery products.
"We tried to set up the barriers to prevent merchants from illegally using private property for their personal profit, but the merchants are just there screaming and refusing to move in any way," an NFFC official said.
The move followed Monday's court ruling that dismissed a petition filed by an emergency committee representing the market's remaining merchants claiming the NFFC was obstructing their businesses.
Earlier last month, the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) also rejected a request filed by the committee for a public inspection into the modernization project.
"Both the court and BAI found against them, and the remaining merchants have no concrete basis to assert their position anymore. We demand that they promptly move to the new building as they agreed last July," the official said.
The merchants said they will not budge.
"Whatever the rulings may be, this is the definition of business obstruction. Who would want to come here, when our image is this tarnished in the media?" one merchant said. "We are suffering losses."
Four people were injured Tuesday in a clash between 100 merchants in the Noryangjin Fisheries Wholesale Market and 40 workers from the market manager, the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives (NFFC), sources said Wednesday.
This is the latest development in the 10-month-long conflict between the two over the modernization of the 49-year-old market in southern Seoul.
The clash came soon after the 40 NFFC workers entered the market premises to barricade off sections currently unoccupied with steel pipes, after 76 percent of merchants there moved to a new building next door as part of a 200 billion won relocation project, initiated by the NFFC.
The 100 merchants are among the remaining 321, or 24 percent of the total 1,334 merchants there, who refuse to relocate to the new building opened in January, citing high rent and dissatisfaction over the less-popular location.
The NFFC said the merchants are illegally occupying the site with many of them using the now-vacant sections to display their own fishery products.
"We tried to set up the barriers to prevent merchants from illegally using private property for their personal profit, but the merchants are just there screaming and refusing to move in any way," an NFFC official said.
The move followed Monday's court ruling that dismissed a petition filed by an emergency committee representing the market's remaining merchants claiming the NFFC was obstructing their businesses.
Earlier last month, the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) also rejected a request filed by the committee for a public inspection into the modernization project.
"Both the court and BAI found against them, and the remaining merchants have no concrete basis to assert their position anymore. We demand that they promptly move to the new building as they agreed last July," the official said.
The merchants said they will not budge.
"Whatever the rulings may be, this is the definition of business obstruction. Who would want to come here, when our image is this tarnished in the media?" one merchant said. "We are suffering losses."
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