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STRONG PULL: An Indonesian sells otah otah in a backlane near Bugis Junction. Illegal hawkers like her say the favourable foreign exchange rate makes the trade lucrative, even if it could mean fines of up to $4,000. -- ST PHOTO: CHEW SENG KIM
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FOREIGNERS are hawking food in ever increasing numbers at places where crowds throng, such as outside MRT stations and temples.
The National Environment Agency (NEA) said that so far this year, 800 illegal hawkers have been caught, and 650 of them were from China, Bangladesh, Mongolia, India and Indonesia.
The foreign presence is boosting the number of unlicensed hawkers fined in the past three years - the number of fines tripled from 2,915 in 2005 to 9,334 last year, with some hawkers fined more than once.
In just the first four months of this year, the NEA has already issued 4,380 summonses for illegal hawking. A number of street hawkers have also been jailed over the years, though the agency was unable to say how many at press time.
The rising numbers prompted the NEA to engage the Aetos auxiliary police last year to help conduct additional patrols in hot spots such as Waterloo Street, Sungei Road and Burmah Road.
The officers also patrol the thoroughfares outside MRT stations in Woodlands, Admiralty, Yishun and Bedok.
The NEA said that some of the foreigners are work permit holders moonlighting as hawkers, but most come here as tourists on social visit passes.
The hawkers typically sell curry puffs, otah-otah (fish paste cakes) and fruit.
One of them is Mr Muhamad Musa, 36, an Indonesian who sells his puffs at an overhead bridge outside Lakeside MRT station.
'I got caught before. But never mind,' he said with a shrug.
Getting caught by NEA officers is part and parcel of their illegal trade, even though it could mean fines of up to $1,000 for a first offence, and a maximum fine of $4,000 or even up to three months' jail, if they are nabbed again.
The profits are still too good - $40 for a morning's work - for them to pass up, owing to the favourable foreign exchange rate, the hawkers explain.
It helps, too, that enforcement officers occasionally turn a blind eye when out on their patrols, they say.
Locals take their chances, too, like a hawker spotted selling fruit in Bedok, who showed The Straits Times a summons sheet issued earlier in the day.
'I have been doing this all my life. What else can I do?' the hawker, who declined to be named, said.
Minor turf tussles even break out between legal and illegal street hawkers.
Mr Ow Kung Seng, 61, who has sold ice cream at Outram Park since 2004, does not mind the illegal hawkers, but will not hesitate in telling them to move if they come too close to his stand. One such person, he said, is a persistent Indonesian curry puff seller who keeps coming back.
'I'll ask him to go elsewhere. Otherwise when the customers buy his curry puffs...they won't come to buy my ice cream,' Mr Ow said.
People who buy from the hawkers say they do so because the food sold is cheap, and also out of pity.
Cabby Ong Bee Seng, 46, who buys curry puffs from illegal hawkers about once a month, said: 'If I pass by, I'll buy if I'm hungry. As long as it's hot and tasty, I'll eat. It's also cheaper.'
Housewife D. Lim, 50, who buys otah-otah from a seller in Ghim Moh Road regularly, feels the hawkers are merely trying to make a living.
But taxi driver Peter Lim, 69, thinks it is too much of a risk, because the environment in which the food is cooked could be unhygienic.
'The curry puffs are cheap, maybe 20 cents cheaper than at other places. But if you fall sick, you will need to spend more money. It's not worth it,' he said.
hliangl@sph.com.sg
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