KF Seetoh: It’s not the hawkers’ duty to feed the poor and destitute

SINGAPORE: In a social media post over the weekend, food guru KF Seetoh clocked a “teeny weeny win for hawker kind,” as he described it. A longtime champion of Singapore’s hawker culture, he has lately been vocal against requiring hawkers, a significant number of whom are struggling to make their businesses profitable, to provide free meals as part of the social enterprise hawker centre (SEHC) model.

“It’s not the hawkers’ duty to feed the poor and destitute. If you cannot afford a meal, please see your MP for help…. It’s a whole-of-nation effort to lift our poor out of the doldrums,” he wrote in an Aug 23 (Saturday) Facebook post but noted that it’s been announced by the Bukit Canberra Hawker Centre operator that the clause requiring stallholders to provide free meals will be removed. The hawker centre is operated by Canopy Hawkers Group.

The Makansutra owner also expressed the hope that the National Environment Agency (NEA), which appoints operators to manage 22 hawker centres, as well as the Singapore Food Agency (SFA), are “relooking the whole system.”

“I hope they resolve it and let us find no reason to revisit these issues,” he wrote, pointing out as well that hawkers agree to “’socially conscious’ contracts because it’s approved by a government they trust.”

Having marked the win at Bukit Canberra Hawker Centre, he went on to call out another operator, alleging that it takes “15 per cent of total sales from successful hawkers, otherwise they pay basic rents and all sorts of fees.”

He noted that these centres not only provide entry-level business opportunities for hawkers but also serve the community. However, since they are built by the government, which also pays operators to manage them, this type of dealings is “not right,” he believes. The food guru also claimed that this operator installs CCTV cameras to monitor sales more strictly and shared a list of fines for stallholders, which cost S$100 per violation. According to Mr Seetoh, it would be better to help the hawkers, and if they are recalcitrant, warn them first before imposing penalties.

He addressed the NEA in his post, asking them to revisit their duties and revise the SEHC system, as “it’s clearly not working. You need a big rethink and even a fresh department or agency consisting of indie thinkers, advocates, experts, and professionals to help you to do this.”

Mr Seetoh’s post has since been shared over 600 times, and even well-known figures have commented on it.

“Thank you for speaking up for our hawkers. We must not allow their landlords to bully them,” noted diplomat and lawyer Tommy Koh.

Singapore’s “Toilet King” Jack Sim, meanwhile, asked, “If they are imposing so much fines on these Hawkers, why is it that the SFA did not impose fines on wealthy coffee shop owners with continuously dirty toilets? Is there some favouritism here?” /TISG

Read also: Bukit Canberra Hawker Centre operator to remove clause requiring stallholders to provide free meals