The Paynesville City Corporation (PCC) Temporary Garbage Site at Du-Port Road Market, intended to be a blessing to residents of the community in terms of easy garbage collection, has become a disaster to residents and marketers, due to its poor management, writes Ojuku Silver-tongue Kangar, Jr.
The site has no security guard and is littered with garbage. Colonies of flies control the area, sit on foodstuffs in the market places and cooked food in cook bowl shops. Cooked bowl shops’ owners complained of poor customership due to the bad garbage odor and flies sitting on foodstuffs when cooking, serving customers, and when customers are eating.
Environmental experts say that the dumpsite is not suitable for garbage disposal.
“The area is not proper for a garbage site because it is the hub of the community where residents and others interact through foodstuffs purchasing and carry out other transaction,” an anonymous environmentalist of the Environmental Protection Agency stated.
“We prefer buying in Red-light Market to Du-Port Road Market because the huge garbage pollutes the foodstuffs in the market and causes poor sanitation in the environment, which is affecting residents to fall prey to malaria. When the rain falls, the area is flooded and the bad garbage odor causes bad air, which makes us sick,” One of the marketers, Grace Jalloh, stated.
According to Anthony Jackson, an assorted goods vendor, the place is littered with garbage, flies are on the rampage, and flooded whenever it rains.
“We have no alternative; the garbage stench embarrasses us daily,” Martha Juah, a marketer, said.
However, the PCC’s Mayor, Palm Belcher Cassell, frowned on the Liberia Marketing Association, which collects ticket fees from the marketers but refuses to remit some of the funds to the PCC for garbage removal, noting that the marketers are the creator of garbage in Paynesville and its environs and even nationwide.
“The site is behind Du-Port Road Market, and is PCC’s Temporary Garbage Site. PCC agrees with Mr. Alexander Peter, the landowner, for the place to be used as a Temporary Garbage site. We pay him for using his land and we can dislodge the garbage whenever it is filled,” Jeremiah K. Diggens, PCC Public Relations Officer, said.
The mindset of Liberians in handling things is bad. They gave their garbage to an insane person, who illegally takes it to the temporary dumpsite without giving a cent to PCC’s Sanitation Department as a service fee. Besides, they feel it is government’s venture, so they treat the place without proper care, according to Diggens.
For compensation, the landlord, Alexander Peters, says he receives an undisclosed amount regularly from the PCC’s authorities for using his land as a Temporary Dumpsite for the city.
“I wrote the PCC authorities sometime in January complaining that their Temporary Dumpsite is causing a public health hazard for the marketers and citizens of Du-Port Road Community by making foodstuffs sold in the marketplace non-hygienic, poor sanitation, a breeding ground for flies and mosquitoes. Pastors and members of the Faith Resurrection Light House Full Gospel Church appealed to me to breach the contrary between PCC and me so that the area can be without garbage presence. PCC replied me on January 9, 2021, saying that they would stop dumping garbage at the area in March of this year, but I am seeing no sign of their promise fulfillment, still dumping garbage there,” private landowner Peter intoned.
Meanwhile, the membership of the Faith Resurrection Light Full Gospel Church adjacent to the dumpsite has declined due to the bad garbage odor, which causes flies and mosquitoes to take over the church during divine worship service and after it.
“We complained to PCC about the embarrassment their Temporary dumpsite has caused us. PCC bought window streams and gave them to the church; we put the streams to every window of the church to prevent flies from entering, but flies and mosquitoes passed through the streams and are on the rampage in the church. The bad situation has shied away the membership,” Pastor Jay G. Doeking noted.