Illegal car parking racket taking residents of Manama for a ride

Manama : A three-men car-parking racket is denying the residents of Manama  their right to park in public places. Operating on the premises of Yateem Centre and Oriental Palace Hotel, the men have been illegally occupying the parking space meant for public for the past several years, by selling it to their clients for BD20 a month.

“All slots are booked for this month and we would give you a slot from next month onwards and that would be BD20 per month,” one of the three racketeers said when DT News approached for a car parking space.

DT News also saw these men harassing motorists who tried to park in that area. 

One of the men in the group who is in charge of parking the vehicle did not even have a driving licence, DT News has learnt.

“We have been living in this locality for the past 30 years and this has been going on ever since. Whenever someone try to park they harass them and do not allow them to park in the area,” said a resident.

 “If you need parking space just pay them their monthly fee and they will arrange everything for you,” a security guard at one of the  shops
said.

Exclusive CCTV footages collected from the area (see pictures) showed the three men come at 4:00am every day and occupy the space for their clients, operating from the comfort of a tree, opposite Oriental Palace
Hotel. 

They occupy the entire space a day before with their cars or setting up barricades. The group then come at 4:00am and arrange the whole place for their clients. They roam around the area until 7pm when all their clients are gone. They use three travel handbags under the tree to keep all the car keys of their customers.

The CCTV footages clearly show how the parking space has been monopolised and how the entire area is empty without any cars and slowly their customers occupy the parking area. DT News spotted one of them with approximately 30 car keys at a time.

When spoke to Mohammed Ali Alkhozaae. Chairman of Capital Municipal Council, he said, “We have marked the area and we are working on installing parking meters. We are looking into this matter and we would solve the issue as soon as we could and make sure there is no inconvenience for the residents in that area. Necessary legal actions will also be taken.”