By The Insight Post
Residents of Buguju Village in Mukono Municipality on Wednesday evening walked a distance of over three kilometers to dump garbage at the Municipality headquarters in a protest against high waste collection charges.
Residents were also carrying placards demanding revocation of the service provider contracted to collect garbage from the Central Division or else create a quick mechanism favouring collection of garbage from low income earners.
On January 1, this year, the municipality contracted De Waste to manage garbage in Goma division and Bins Kampala limited in the Central Division as well as Namakya enterprises limited to manage its landfill at Katikoro.
However, until now the municipality failed to come up with clear and fixed charging guidelines for residents, but it instead stopped other local private collectors from operating in the area.
Wilber Daniels Mulondo, a resident from Buguju says before the firms were contracted, local garbage collectors could remove garbage dumped along the roads, but currently, specifically Bins requires them to pay between Shillings 18, 000 to 40, 000 on a monthly basis for collecting garbage from their homes.
He further notes that the Bins rejected their request for paying charges in installments an instead insisted of demanding for a full monthly payment.
Another resident, Jamiru Balukusa wants the municipal authorities to revive the operations of the municipal trucks which are grounded at the headquarters than depending on the service provider who only deploys one vehicle to collect garbage from the entire division.
Since February, the garbage trucks for the municipality have since been parked at the headquarters with the authorities confirming that the tender for garbage collection was awarded to a private contractor.
This is not the first time residents have been protesting costly collection of garbage, several times the business community, specifically Kikooza and Kame Valley markets, have protested by dumping garbage in the middle of the road. Within the business communities, Bins charge between 30, 000 to 70, 000 shillings.
In the agreement signed between Bins and the municipality, the municipality confirms that the service provider emerged the best bidder and good for the work.
It however reserved the powers to develop the pricing schedule which the contractor has to use in executing her day to day waste collection services within her defined service zones.
The Executive Director of Bins Kampala limited, Paul Nduhura insists that the municipality has failed to sensitize residents about their responsibilities.
He notes that they use the money collected from locals to supplement the little budget from the municipality to perform duties which involve fueling trucks, paying persons involved in the collection among other things, which make it hard for his company to offer free services.
However, the signed agreement mandates the council to support the wages road sweaepers, road gangs, waste loaders, monitoring scouts and drivers.
We have established that some of these are members of the private service provider but paid by the council lately.
Mukono Municipality Senior Law Enforcement Officer, James Nsimbi says the signed agreement has a lot of loopholes and cannot solve the problem of garbage within the targeted area.
He notes that they are yet to revise it if not completely revoking it. The agreement mandates the private contractor to at least collect 50 tons of garbage on a daily basis but so far about 5tons are collected besides several illegal dumping sites increasing in the area.
Statistics from the Mukono Municipality Environment Officer indicate that over 270 tons of garbage are generated on a daily basis within Goma and Mukono Central Division. However, only 69 tons are collected on a monthly basis.
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