Public outrage over video of woman stripped off of street food cart

AMMAN — Social media users have voiced their outrage over a video circulating online of a woman weeping on a sidewalk in western Amman's Um Uthainah after municipal workers confiscated her food cart.

In the video, the elderly woman is seen sitting on a pavement in the Um Uthainah neighbourhood as she cries complaining that officials of the Greater Amman Municipality (GAM) have confiscated her food cart and thrown her food on the pavement in addition to verbally assaulting her.

Until Thursday noon, more than 8,000 Facebook users commented on the video, which was also shared over 8,000 times.

The video was taped and posted on Wednesday by journalist Eman Okour, who wrote on her timeline that the elderly woman, Um Ramez, has been selling food to passersby for the past three years to support and raise her children.

Okour called on people to share her story to do her justice and urged the public to help her out.

Comments on the video mostly expressed condemnation of the GAM personnel's confiscation of the food cart and alleged verbal assault against the woman.

An official at GAM said that municipal employees were enforcing the laws that prohibit blocking a sidewalk and selling food to people without providing basic health and safety requirements, adding that the municipal employees from the department responsible for controlling random selling had been warning the woman of the breaches, which she failed to rectify.

"She has been informed more than once for the past six months that it was against the law to block a sidewalk and sell food without obtaining a licence or even providing the basic health and safety requirements for selling food," the official, who requested anonymity, told The Jordan Times on Thursday.

He underlined that her food cart was more like a "mobile restaurant", noting that "the very same people voicing outrage for confiscating the food cart will blame GAM and hold it responsible if people get food poisoning after eating from random food carts".

On the verbal assault allegations against the woman, the official claimed that the woman verbally assaulted GAM employees and was the one who threw the food on the pavement.

The municipal official also noted that GAM is willing to give needy people, including the woman, a permanent location at one of its popular markets to run a licensed food cart that is monitored by its health inspectors, upon request and after evaluating humanitarian cases.

But Facebook users urged GAM to "let the woman be", saying that the municipality "exercises its power on the weak".