The quest of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA) to rollout a pilot sanitation exercise in the Central Business District (CBD) of Kumasi, which is increasingly getting filthy owing to the activities of hawkers and transport unions, is raising more questions than answers.
Over the years, waste collection in the CBD has always been a challenge the KMA has been grappling with.
Interestingly, The Chronicle understands that Kumasi has about ten companies which process plastics, however, plastic wastes have held the city to ransom.
In an attempt to confront this challenge, about four years ago, the former Chief Executive Officer of the KMA, Osei-Assibey, introduced a similar exercise which was aimed at curbing the dumping of waste on the streets of the Metropolis, by installing waste bins at almost all vantage points, however, the exercise failed owing to poor supervision and education by the Assembly.
Waste bins were seen overflowing with rubbish in broad daylight at various points of the CBD. Moreover, some people stole the waste bins to their homes for reasons which are only known to them.
Last week, residents of Kumasi woke up to the news that the KMA, under the leadership of Samuel Pyne, was set to rollout another sanitation initiative called “Keep Kumasi Clean; Let’s Recycle.”
Supported with a €2.5 million Euros grant facility from the European Union (E.U) under the Local Authorities Partnerships For Sustainable Cities, the programme aims for the Holistic Reinforcement For Sustainable Development (HORESD) of Kumasi.
Per the initiative, waste generated in the CBD was going to be segregated from degradable to biodegradable, with plastic waste earmarked for industrial purposes.
It comes along with eight roll-off garbage trucks and 1,000 pieces and sizes of litter waste containers.
It is instructive to state that the assembly has embarked on education among the market women which aims to conscientised them about three months concerning the impending exercise. .
This week, The Chronicle embarked on a working visit to the congested CBD, and it was an eyesore to see mountainous garbage in front of the transport station, adjacent the under-construction Central Market, which work had stalled.
Apart from the above description, areas such as Doctor Mensah, Roman Hill among others, remain in abject filth, raising question about the fate of the impending programme.
Reached on phone, Madam Henrietta Afia Konadu, Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the KMA, acknowledged the heaps of garbage around the under-construction Central Market.
According to Afia Konadu, the vehicle which was supposed to collect the garbage conked out Tuesday dawn at 2:00am, hence it could not perform its duty.
“We know that today we have some challenge in some parts of the CBD.”
Madam Henrietta indicated that the dust bins were of two colours, namely brown and blue, with each colour ascribed to a particular type of waste.
Quizzed on how education on segregation of the waste had been accepted by the market women and others in the CBD, Afia Konadu indicated that the Assembly met the stakeholders as far back as last year in the CBD on the project.
“We did twelve days of pitching camp within parts of the Central Business District. We started from Sanbra, Boss FM, Lansah Chemist, Cal Bank, MTN Zone, PZ, Opoku Trading, where the traders spoke about it, and they were given [an] opportunity to ask questions. Their leaders came on board to find out about how this is going to be.”
She indicated that the education had been on radio, television and in-person, “where we went to people’s shop, place of hawking among others.”
Asked about when exactly the programme would kick start, the KMA PRO could not give a date, except to say it would start in the month of November.
Quizzed on if the ‘Keep Kumasi Clean; Let’s Recycle’ project was an antidote to the waste challenge in the CBD, Afia Konadu told this reporter that the Assembly could not police bins, but they were hopeful the programme would be successful.
