News
Unsorted garbage a headache for CMC despite mega cleanup
Garbage collection in Colombo city has resumed with Mayor Rosy Senanayake assuming duties but there is still no solution to the problem of residents failing to segregate their garbage.
Uncollected garbage
The huge garbage dumps at roadsides were cleared in what authorities called “a massive operation” by Colombo Municipal Council (CMC) trucks and tractors after weeks of being left untended. Private cleaning groups working alongside CMC garbage collectors were sorting the unsegregated garbage on roadsides.
Truck drivers and collectors complain that people are not separating out their garbage and that since unsegregated garbage cannot be unloaded at the Muthurajawela waste management site they are being forced to sort it themselves.
There have been rising tensions between garbage collectors and residents.
In Dematagoda, collectors were seen trying to segregate garbage as much as possible but leaving behind rubbish they could not sort out, drawing angry reactions from residents.
Heated arguments between residents and garbage collectors at Maligawatte were witnessed when collectors refused to collect mixed garbage.
Some residents at the flats were seen arguing with garbage truck drivers for not accepting plastic waste but only degradable waste.
Mohomad Asam Mohomad Fizar, a resident living near the Premadasa Stadium, claimed collectors only took away garbage if offered bribes.
He said the area was only visited by a truck that collected degradable waste and non-degradable garbage was not collected.
“We are shouted at when we bring out our polythene to give them,” Mr. Fizar said. “They fail to understand that we have limited space in our homes and they pounce on us and demand, we bring it out to them on another day.”
In contrast, CMC workers made daily collections of mixed waste from shops regardless of the garbage collection regulations, Mr. Fizar said.
Collectors say they collect mixed waste from certain shops to reduce the accumulation of large amounts of mixed waste.
Maligawatte Garbage Deport Supervisor Rohitha Weeraman supported collectors’ complaints that non-segregation of rubbish created difficulties. He said most of the workers were forced to dump garbage at roadsides to be separated and collected later by themselves. Plastic water bottles, beverage containers and lunchboxes were separated from metal and glass.
Asam Mohammed Faiaz
“We provide most of the recyclable material to our employees. They reuse them or provide them to private recyclers,” he said.
Colombo’s new Mayor Senanayake said that at a meeting attended by Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, Megapolis and Western Development Minister Champika Ranawaka and CMC officials on Monday, the CMC had been given one month’s grace to continue to dump waste.
Municipal workers were now engaged in the task of physically separating unsegregated garbage. This was unsustainable and residents must segregate their garbage according to municipality requirements, she said.
“Within the next year, we will have permanent solutions for dumping,” Mrs. Senanayake insisted, adding that projects such as the Aruwakkalu sanitary landfill and waste-to-energy projects were due to commence operations by the middle of 2019. The CMC is negotiating providing garbage needed for one of the waste-to-energy projects.
Minister Ranawaka said his ministry was setting up sanitary landfill sites at Aruwakkalu in Puttalam and at Karadiyana.
He claimed that in the year since he had set up a sanitary landfill project at Muthurajawela, 80 per cent of the people had begun sorting their waste.
“It is the Colombo Municipality’s responsibility to get the public 100 percent involved in providing segregated garbage,” he said. “If everyone segregates garbage the issue can be easily resolved,” he said.
Mr. Ranawaka said the Aruwakkalu landfill site would be opened for use by the end of the year.
CMC workers collecting degradable waste. However, it was observed that they failed to collect the plastic waste
Behind the Premadasa stadium, garbage being segregated by workers belonging to a private waste disposal company.