A strike and a sit-in in the Qamishlo market center due to the royalties of the Democratic Union Party (PYD administration affiliated with the PKK)
Yekiti Media
Shop owners in Qamishlo city center staged a sit-in in front of the People’s Municipality of the Democratic Union Party (PYD affiliated with the PKK), in protest against the royalties imposed by the administration on them under various pretexts.
A shop owner reported that the sit-in was preceded by a general strike in the Al-Salam complex adjacent to the municipality, by closing the shops, due to the royalties, which he described as excessive and ill-considered. Adding, saying: Today they invented the “vacancy tax”, which ranges from 600,000 SYP to 700,000 SYP.” according to the area of the shop and the type of goods in it, knowing that this tax is imposed only during the process of selling the shop because the ownership of the property belongs to the municipality of the regime.”
The owner of the shop, who preferred not to reveal his name, noted that the municipality demanded that in addition to the last “tax” last February, three years’ advance payment for each of the rent and rental “tax” amounting to 400,000 Syrian pounds and the provision of “licenses” which cost 99,000 pounds, and all of this entails they have to bring a clearance from the finances for the past and current years 2022, which may cost them to pay an amount exceeding one million Syrian pounds, and the monthly “tax” for cleaning has been raised from 1,000 SYP to 5,000 SYP.
The source indicated that the regime’s institutions are still in place and everyone is obliged to pay all the financial, rent, rental and municipal services that are due to it, but the amounts do not amount to 5% of what the PYD imposes.
The source expressed his anger by saying: “The movement of the markets is almost stopped, the living conditions are getting worse every day than the next, and the prices of foodstuffs are very high, for example, the price of a kilo of tomatoes has reached 4000 Syrian pounds, in addition to all that, all the basic materials in the PYD-controlled areas of Bread, gas, diesel and gasoline are of the worst types, and getting them is very difficult, or you have to go to more than one center for them to get fifty liters of benzin a month, and by what right do they demand these irrational and irresponsible taxes.”
It is reported that the areas controlled by the PYD (affiliated with the PKK) are experiencing a state of extreme poverty due to the economic conditions experienced by the people of those areas and the royalties imposed by the latter, which caused thousands of young people from the region to migrate to European countries.
