By Conrad Mwanawashe
HARARE residents living on the outskirts of Budiriro 4 have, for about two decades, been forced to co-exist with strange ‘neighbours’.
Dogs and cats carcasses, pampers for the old and young, flies invading their houses, and cattle straying from Harare City Council paddocks nearby, have spelt disaster for the residents.
Threats of violence and verbal abuse from rowdy characters dumping solid waste on their doorstep, the residents have seen hell.
Budiriro 4 borders Harare City Council paddocks and residents on that borderline face an illegal waste dump that has attracted all kinds of problems for them.
“This other day, I almost picked a fight with some people who had dumped their waste close to our gate. It’s disgusting to see dogs and cats carcasses on your doorstep,” said Richard Kucherera, one of the residents in whose field the illegal dump site extended.
Photo credit – Conrad Mwanawashe
“Shop owners from Budiriro 4 send their employees to dump their waste on this illegal waste dump and this is making life difficult for us. This is because Harare City Council is not collecting waste,” added Kucherera.
Therein lies the problem, non-collection of solid waste, according to the Environmental Management Agency (EMA) spokesperson Amkela Sidange.
“Local authorities haven’t really come out to ensure that collection of waste is done as scheduled,” said Sidange.
“However, we have seen some commendable efforts in Ruwa and Epworth Local Boards to a certain extent, they’re doing so well in terms of collection of waste and we are seeing a reduction of illegal dumps. But we’re still to see similar efforts in the City of Harare, especially and Chitungwiza,” she added.
“We’ve realised some baby steps in our collaboration. There are some local authorities who have shown keen interest but some are still in the shadows. They haven’t really come out. We we’re yet to see that kind of approach that we’re expecting. We haven’t seen the best from these local authorities hoping they’re still doing the best but I think it’s taking too much time.”
President Mnangagwa declared the poor waste management in the four Harare Metropolitan councils, Harare, Chitungwiza, Epworth and Ruwa, a “state of disaster”, after government had noted the deplorable state of cleanliness of the Harare Metropolitan Province as the local authorities were unable to manage their waste.
The state of disaster declaration was published in terms of the Civil Protection Act under Statutory Instrument 140 of 2023 cited as the Civil Protection (Declaration of State of Disaster: Emergency Solid Waste Management Harare Metropolitan Province) Notice, 2023.
EMA was appointed as the lead government agency tasked with the oversight role of coordinating waste removal, monitoring and enforcing remedial actions.
The major activities that were listed as part of remedial actions, include removal of illegal dumps.
“We have also issues were local authorities have to submit plans to the Agency, and the Agency to monitor that the plans are implemented religiously, also ordering local authorities to ring fence the funds that are meant for solid waste management, installation of bins in public places and awareness raising.
“As the Agency we hit the ground running when the declaration was made out of concern for the integrity of the environment and public health,” said Sidange.
“Removal of waste dumps has been going on with a target of about removing 800 illegal waste dumps that were made across the province. To date we have about 348 illegal waste dumps that have been cleared. We are about a month and half into the programme meaning that we should be at about 50% but we are at about 348 because we have been running against a moving target.
“I’m calling it a moving target because when dumps are cleared they quickly recur. This is one challenge that we have been facing in that instead of doing the hit and run, clearing and move on to the next problem, we have been forced to go back and clear again where we had cleared before because illegal dumping is still continuing,” she added.
Kucherera commended EMA for clearing the illegal waste dump that was on his doorstep in Budiriro 4.
“I want to thank EMA for clearing the illegal waste dumps. And we hope that they will continue to monitor waste collection so that illegal dumping will not recur,” said Kucherera.
His sister, Roselyn said: “We are sometimes abused by some rowdy people if we try to stop them from dumping waste close to our premises. Pampers, dogs and cats carcasses are sometimes thrown close to our gate. Budiriro 4 has had outbreaks of cholera a number times and we suspect it is because of the illegal dumps.”
Chitungwiza Town Council spokesperson Lovemore Meya called for a change of mindset among communities to stop recurrence of illegal waste dumps.
“The recurrence of illegal dumps is because of the need for mindset change within the communities. Whenever we clear dumps the communities are back again dumping solid waste on those illegal sites.
“In Chitungwiza we’re intensifying dumps clearance and collection of solid waste. However, although we’ve improved in service delivery, we are constrained in terms of resources. Instead of having eight refuse compactors, we only have three, which is hindering our efforts,” said Meya.
“In terms of collection efficiency, we are at 100% save to say that we expect to do door-to-door collections twice a week but currently we’re managing to do that only once a week due to resources constrains. Residents are also complaining of bin liners and we are working with EMA to provide those.
“We expect service delivery to continue to improve to all the areas following the acquisition of state of the art equipment that we have since started to make use of. We are currently clearing silt that has been cleared off from storm water drains. We expect to cascade the programme to all the areas having started in St Mary’s,” added Meya.
On installation of bins as part of remedial action, Sidange said EMA has engaged corporates and mining companies for empty drums that can be fabricated into bins.
“To date we’re sitting on a ‘beautiful’ pledge of about 510 full drums from the corporates, mining communities and individuals which are currently being fabricated to be turned into bins,” said Sidange.
