Garbage piles up as operation Chenesa Harare ends

THE opposition-led Harare City Council is struggling to continue with adequate garbage collection following the easing of ‘Operation Chenesa Harare’ by the Government.

Piles of garbage have since started to accumulate in some suburbs like Mbare, Warren Park, Highfield and Budiriro, leaving residents at risk of diseases such as cholera, typhoid and malaria. Collections even in the low-density suburbs are returning to the intermittent levels seen before Operation Chenesa.

City spokesperson, Mr Stanley Gama, said they have introduced schedules for garbage collection in all suburbs in Harare.

“We have scheduled that at least once a week and in each and every suburb, garbage should be collected by the city council refuse collection vehicles,” he said.

Mr Gama said council will scale up its garbage collection activities when the second batch of tractors is delivered.

“We have received 31 of the 52 tractors from Government. We are waiting for the second batch of tractors and other implements which include trailers and grass cutters for mowing grass, hauling trash to the appropriate location and cleaning the drainage system,” he said.

However, residents are saying there is no weekly garbage collection.

“Garbage was removed during the Operation Chenesa, as for the city council refuse collection vehicles we are yet to see them on our roads,” said a Warren Park 1 resident, Ms Priscilla Makudo.

Another resident from Kambuzuma suburb, Mrs Katsuro, said:

“Bins were only collected once in January.

“The vehicle came and it was speeding that we failed to dispose our garbage. We missed the vehicle and the bins were not collected”.

Government has facilitated a tractor deal as part of the growing ties between Zimbabwe and Belarus at government to government level.

A batch of 52 tractors has been loaned to the city council by Biston Agro Machinery, a Belarusian company, with 31 of them being commissioned into municipal services in January this year.