Babe Market Construction In Kudus Still Waiting For Asset Elimination

A trader is waiting for a buyer by occupying a temporary selling place, after the Used Goods Market in Jati Wetan Village, Jati District, Kudus Regency caught fire. (ANTARA/Akhmad Nazaruddin Lathif)

KUDUS - Construction of the Used Goods Market (Babe) in Jati Wetan Village, Jati District, Kudus Regency, Central Java, after the fire was still waiting for the removal of building assets. After that, it can only be submitted to the auction stage. "Until now, we are still waiting for the process of removing the assets of the Babe Market building, which currently only remains in the rubble of the building after the severe fire," said Head of the Market Management Division of the Kudus Trade Office Albertus Harys Yunanto in Kudus, as reported by Antara, Monday, August 12. After the asset removal process is complete, he said, his party will only be able to auction off the Babe Market construction project. For the planning stage for Babe Market development, it has been completed, so the next stage proposes an auction to the Goods Procurement Section of the Kudus Regency Secretariat. He revealed that the Babe Market construction was prepared with a budget of Rp. 1.5 billion from unexpected funds because previously it experienced a fire that scorched all kiosks and merchandise for traders. Meanwhile, one of the traders at Babe Market, Wibi, admitted that his merchandise, which was worth around Rp. 90 million, was burned down. "Before the fire broke out on July 5, 2024, I had started merchandise twice. So when the fire broke out, it really ran out of capital," he said. Although most traders started selling again, he admitted that he could not sell anymore because he had to look for business capital. Wibi said, with the money from selling pedaling bicycles, finally three weeks ago he was only able to build a 2x2 meter stall. "For shopping for merchandise, it can only be done a few days after building a kiosk using used wood," he said. He hopes that when the market building is rebuilt there will be assistance from the Kudus Regency Government in building a new kiosk, because for now it does not have enough funds to build a kiosk in a newly built place.

The fire that hit Babe Market spent 276 stalls of traders with a total of 200 traders. Meanwhile, the potential loss due to the fire at the Bekas Goods Market reached Rp2 billion.