Angry residents accuse county government over dumping of garbage at a cemetery

The Mountain Journal

A public cemetery in Gikono area Murang’a has been ‘converted’ to a garbage dumping site, endangering the lives of the community in the locality.

In the past three weeks, tonnes of waste have been dumped at the facility by trucks allegedly coming from Nairobi and Thika towns direction after 10 pm.

The public protested the dumping of the waste in the locality, which is barely half a kilometre from Mitumbiri Sanitary Landfill presently under construction at an estimated Sh1 billion from the World Bank.

They protested after scavengers from Nairobi started trooping in the cemetery burning carcasses of dogs, and polluting the environment with smoke and other haphardaze materials.

Investigations revealed that businesspersons in the major towns have pooled resources, hired trucks to dump waste from their premises to avoid paying their respective county governments.

 James Mwangi, a resident, said the county government should crack whip and arrest the individuals transporting the waste to the area during the curfew hours.

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“We recently buried a woman who suffered breathing complications suspected to have originated from the burning of the waste. The county government does not have a public waste management policy, that could be enforced,” said Mwangi.

 Murang’a County Environment and Natural Resources CEC, Cecilia Kibe said there are naughty transporters who dumped the waste in the areas after 10 pm.

 She said they have engaged the Murang'a South Security Committee led by DCC Mawira Mungania and police commander Alex Shikondi to support in enforcing the regulations, and arrest the rogue businesspersons behind the syndicate.  

She denied the county government trucks involvement in the night operations saying there are designated dumping sites that are used  for the sanitation purposes.

“We have done our best by putting the enforcement teams along the route but the rogue drivers  use shortcuts and keep on changing their dumping sites,” said Ms Kibe.

 Muranga South Sub county administrator James Githii said they have been working with the community to keep off the intruders.

“ Since the community is alert, all efforts  will be employed to arrest the trouble shooters,” said Mr Githii.

 Construction of the landfill designed for 250 metric tonnes daily was last year interrupted by Covid 19 and heavy rains.

Three years ago, Murang’a leaders including the senators Irungu Kang’ata, and MPs flew to Durban, South Africa to learn how landfills operate, while  the MCAs were taken to Arusha, Tanzania for a bench marking on waste management.

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