Lagos battles refuse heaps

AKIN ADEWAKUN and CHIMA NWOKOJI dug into the controversies surrounding waste management in Lagos State.
“We are not relenting in refuse collection,” Lagos State Commissioner for Information, Mr Kehinde Bamigbetan, declared on Facebook on Friday as he intensified his social media reporting of the day and night evacuation of refuse from the streets of Lagos. The reports have shown how dire the refuse situation has become in recent weeks in Lagos.

From Ojuelegba in Surulere, to Ikeja, to Yaba, to Akowonjo in Alimosho Local Government Area, between Wednesday and Friday; spirited efforts were made by officials of the state and local governments as well as those of Visionscape, the new company in charge of refuse collection and management in Lagos, to rid the state of its filthy afflictions.

The 57 chairmen of Local Government and Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs) in Lagos State had on Tuesday threw their weight behind the new waste management policy of the state government encapsulated in the Cleaner Lagos Initiative.

Rising from an emergency meeting on the resurgence of refuse on major highways and road medians across the state, the chairmen expressed optimism in the effectiveness of the new policy to birth a comprehensive and world-class waste management system, just as they urged residents to cooperate with government during the transition period.

“We are aware that Visionscape has successfully set up its system in Lagos State. It has employed personnel to carry out many of these functions. It has also been able to receive some percentage of its equipment which it is deploying gradually to residential areas and also trying to evacuate waste,” the chairmen said in a communique at the end of a meeting.

Arrest of cart pushers

The announcement made recently by the Lagos Task Force of the arrest of more than 30 cart pushers for violating environmental sanitation laws in the state, however, brought to the fore, the debate as to whether or not there has been a breakdown in waste management system in the state for the past few weeks.

“The government suspects that the cart pushers are being used to sabotage the cleaner Lagos Initiative,” said a source.

Since the arrests, one of the questions on the lips of many residents of the state and other stakeholders has been how the state managed to arrive at this “sorry state” again, considering its history of effective waste management.

This became more pertinent since residents had thought the state had effectively left behind, the era of using cart pushers to dispose of waste in the metropolis, especially with the advent of Public Sector Participants (PSP) operators contracted by the state government years ago to handle waste management duties in the state.

In fact, one of the tangible dividends of democracy residents could readily point to at that point was the ease with which their waste were being disposed and the enhancement of the streets, a development made possible through effective waste management system put in place by the state government and executed by the private businesses charged with cleaning the state.

“It was really a clean and fresh break from the past then. It was a break from that past when we always struggled to move through heaps of refuse in different parts of the Lagos metropolis, including the city’s highways,” Godwin, an artist, who lives on Modupe Street, Ikeja, recalled. According to him, that was an era when fresh human faeces packed in polythene bags was a common sight on the median of Obafemi Awolowo Way, Ikeja.

“Having seen the impressive value-chain in the new waste management architecture, the Lagos State Government is determined to make it work. Convinced that this will be in the best overall interest of the state, it has asked for the people to be patient, assuring them that victory for Lagos State in waste management is just around the corner. It was this conviction that made Lagos State to ban the cart pushers and wheel barrow operators, believing without any doubt that their continuous operation will be inimical to the health and safety of the people of Lagos Sate,” a government source said.

Nostalgia?

The days of effective waste management had appeared to be gradually fading from the memories of many within the metropolis as heaps of refuse seemed to be gradually finding their way back.

Godwin and many other residents who had enjoyed this “respite” for some time now expressed concern over the return of waste heaps in different parts of the city. Even areas considered as the home of the affluent, where one would ordinarily expect zero tolerance for such an unwholesome development appeared not to be spared.

Huge refuse sites had become commonplace in areas inhabited by the high and the low. Residents of Ajah community, Broad Street in Marina, Awolowo Road in Ikoyi, down to Ogba, Iyana Ipaja and Ejigbo on the mainland, were suddenly being threatened by waste, a situation seen as an indication that the city was having a had time to manage the about 13,000 metric tonnes of waste it generates on a daily basis.

While many are confused about the cause of this latest development, it had been a blame game between the state government and the PSP operators, whom the state, accused of lacking the capacity to effectively manage waste in the state; hence its decision to hire another company. The state government’s decision to wield the big stick on the activities of cart pushers is also not going down well with some residents who had seen them as their last hope of disposing of their wastes.

Last resort?

Kayode, a secondary school teacher and a resident of the Iyana Ejigbo area wondered why the state government would take such a decision when it was obvious that efforts at resolving waste management issues had not yielded the needed fruits. The school teacher expressed the belief that banning cart pushers would worsen the challenge of waste management being presently faced in all parts of Lagos, especially the suburbs, where LAWMA and PSP hardly reach. According to him, residents are, for now, not even sure of who is in charge as far as waste management in the state is concerned. “At the moment, wastes are now being heaped on roads, street junctions, bus stops and every available open space in the neighbourhood. To me, the mechanism put in place to ensure cleaner Lagos is far from being effective. If we are serious about the mega city vision, and I believe that this is putting Lagosians at the risk of contracting diseases,” Kayode stated.

Another resident, who pleaded anonymity, urged the state governor, Akinwunmi Ambode, to either compel the new investors to ensure streets of Lagos are clean and remain so. She, however, expressed regret that many residents are resorting to self-help by incinerating or burying their wastes. According to her, it does not solve the current waste problem but would only pollute the environments, and create more problems for themselves and the unborn generation. “For waste to be managed more sustainably, it is important that those generating wastes today think ahead and search for alternatives that do not pass on the problems to future generations,” she stated.

Expert’s counsel

An environmentalist and expert in Urban and Regional Planning, Michael Simire, agreed to the above assertion. “The present waste situation in the metropolis is worrisome, and unless something urgent is done, the safety of the environment could be compromised,” he said.

“Refuse is a combination of several items. Some are toxic and others are dangerous and constitute major hazards. Unfortunately, indiscriminate burning of refuse which residents have resorted to in the past few weeks would only further put the environment at risk. Besides, when you burn, you still leave some particles which might, at the end of the day, be very hazardous to the health of individuals living around the area. So, nothing is as safe as properly disposing of one’s waste after it has been generated,” he stated.

Faulty reform?

But investigations by Saturday Tribune as to the cause of the resurgence of wastes in all parts of the metropolis revealed that the residents might need to wait a bit longer before the restoration of those good old days. For instance, while the present development may not be unconnected with the recent reforms being carried out by the state government in its bid to ensure a cleaner Lagos, it is obvious that some loopholes would need to be addressed before that dream can be achieved.

For instance, it was gathered that a good number of the residents no longer pay their waste bills. Rather than pay, they now take their wastes to the highways or simply burn them within the neighbourhood.

“The plan is for residents to dispose of their wastes at their doorsteps and not on the highways. But when the government begins to put bins in different parts of the metropolis, the message it is indirectly sending is that residents should be dumping their wastes where the bins are, including the highways. That is why you see heaps of refuse everywhere,” Lekan Owojori, a consultant to the Association of Waste Managers of Nigeria, argued.

The decision of the state government to concession some of the dumpsites in the state such as the Olusosun dumping ground in Ojota, is seen by stakeholders as an error on the part of the government.

Investigations showed that operators are presently having issues dumping their refuse at the Olusosun dumping ground because there are no equipment to push farther the ones already dumped there. “The fact remains that dumping ground should not be seen as a money-making venture despite being capital-intensive. I think it is an error for the government to concession this to private hands. One of the reasons we are seeing wastes all around today is simply because the contractor handling the site is just not ready to invest much in the business for now. We are seeing all these delays because there are no bulldozers to evacuate and push farther some of this refuse to allow further dumping. There is no way your services to your clients would not be affected once you experience such delays at dumping grounds. The public would not know this,” one of the operators, who did not want his name mentioned, explained.

Cleaner Lagos Initiative is rock solid —Govt

A top government official who spoke off record assured residents that they would start seeing the impact while urging the people to be vigilant and watch out for saboteurs who are hell-bent on thwarting the initiative.

He said the tragedy of the situation is that some entrenched, vested interests did not want the Cleaner Lagos Initiative to work and they are resolute to go to any length to frustrate the project, including fighting dirty.

“People asked, why did the Lagos State Government decide to introduce a new system to the arrangement between Lagos State Waste Management Authority and the PSPs, which seemed to be working? From the information now in public domain, upon assumption of office, the Akinwunmi Ambode administration commissioned an investigation into why Lagos drains and canals were perennially blocked, how could the state find a solution to the eyesores that its dumping ground in Ojota and other places had become and how could waste be better managed in the state? The findings were shocking. LAWMA had about 150 rickety compactors while many of the compactors owned by the PSPoperators were constantly breaking down. The compactors mustered by both LAWMA and the PSPs were also considered inadequate when benchmarked against the over 10,000 tonnes of waste generated daily in the State. People resorted to self-help and started dumping waste in drains and canals.

“The report also showed that the Olusosun and Igando dump sites were ticking time bombs waiting to explode. There was simply no plan to treat the waste after dumping them at the sites. The Cleaner Lagos Initiative was therefore formulated to address all the flaws noticed in the previous arrangement. While the state government still allowed the PSPs to be involved in the waste management process, it gave them the task to manage what was thought out to be the lucrative commercial side of the business while LAWMA would manage the market areas. Visionscape is saddled with the responsibility to manage residential waste. Determined to implement a strategy that will fast forward Lagos into a smart city with all the accoutrement of a clean environment, the state government signed a pact with a consortium led by Visionscape, an environmental utility group, which has managed waste in 13 countries including the United Kingdom and United Arab Emirates.

“Once the pact was sealed, Visionscape started deploying its resources. As a reputable company with global footprints, it sought to know how the volume of waste in Lagos was generated. It’s research team went into every nook and cranny of Lagos including the impoverished riverine communities like Makoko. The Lagos State Government now knows where and how waste is generated in the state and a strategy has been perfected on how to evacuate the waste seamlessly,” the government source who asked not to be named told Saturday Tribune.

The source close to Governor Ambode added that it was the outcome of the survey and the outlined strategy by Visionscape and other stakeholders that made the governor to assure Lagos residents that the state is on course to become one of the cleanest megacities in the world in due course.

However, a long drawn out legal battle between the Lagos State Government and the PSPs, which happily for both sides is now on the verge of resolution, and other logistic challenges stalled the plan to quickly bring in the facilities to implement the CLI.

It was gathered that the first batch of equipment brought in by Visionscape for the CLI project were cleared at the Ports on the eve of Christmas last year.

Two weeks ago, the company organised a media facility tour to show the scale of its operation. The event was slated for the Tapa Transfer Loading Station at Lagos Island. The completed TLS retrofitted with all kinds of modern facilities is one of the four to be modernised by Visionscape. Work has also reached advanced stage on the TLS at Oshodi. The other facilities at Mushin and Agege will also be upgraded. Facilities at the TLS includes a central tipping bay, a waste reception bay, administrative buildings. In addition to the TLS, Visionscape also showcased 100 trucks and other facilities.

However, a source close to Visionscape said on Friday that “work has reached advanced stage on the construction of West Africa’s first Engineered Sanitary Landfill in Epe. The whole essence is to upgrade the waste management process in the State in line with global best practices. Two other such landfills will be built. Upon its full realisation, the Epe landfill will have a recycling plant and generate electricity from the waste dumped there.”

“Visionscape plans to deploy between 500 and 600 brand new compactors to manage waste collection in Lagos State. It is also deploying mechanised street sweepers and other innovations. An immediate benefit of the Cleaner Lagos State Initiative to the people is job creation. Previously, about 7,000 people were involved in cleaning the streets. This number has now been ramped up to 27,500 people who are now known as Community Sanitation Workers (CSW). They are well-kitted with good remuneration packages including insurance benefits. They will also only work in their wards to eliminate any additional spend on transportation. About 1million electronically tracked bins are also being distributed across Lagos State,” another source told Saturday Tribune.

Govt, PSP operators settle rift 

Meanwhile, the Lagos State government and PSP operators have agreed to amicably resolve the dispute leading to a suit before a Lagos High Court in Igbosere on the implementation of the Cleaner Lagos Initiative (CLI).

The PSP operators had sued the State Government and the environmental utility group contracted to implement the new initiative, Visionscape to contest the alleged decision to jettison them for a new investor for the collection and disposal of waste in the State.

When the case came up again on Wednesday before Justice Oyekan Abdullahi, counsel to the PSP operators, Tosin Adesioye, told the court that parties in the suit had made substantial progress on the discussion to settle the matter.

The lawyer also applied for two more weeks to be granted to the parties to perfect the terms of settlement.

Responding, counsel to the State Government, Mr Saheed Quadri, affirmed the position of the counsel to the PSP operators, saying that it was true that parties had met severally even up till Wednesday (yesterday) on the issue.

The matter was subsequently adjourned to January 29, 2018 for final terms of settlement.

Our duty is to arrest offenders –Task Force

When contacted by Saturday Tribune on the arrest of cart pushers, the Public Relations Officer, Lagos Task Force, Mr Adebayo Taofiq, said the duty of the agency was to ensure that laws governing waste management and others in the state are obeyed by residents. He said further that it fell within the purview of the agency’s mandate to arrest cart pushers and residents of the state who dispose of their waste indiscriminately.

“There are laws governing waste management in the state. One of the duties of the Task Force is to ensure that such laws are complied with. We have the duty to arrest those who dump refuse on the median and other illegal places. And that is what you have seen us do of late,” he added.