By Taban Henry
Some residents of Juba’s Hai Malakal neighborhood have criticized the Juba city council authorities for failing to properly manage garbage collection in the city and particularly their residential areas.
The residents said solid waste are being piled close to their houses blocking water channels which in turn flood their homes with water once it rains.
One affected resident who spoke to the media on condition of anonymity for personal security reasons said they are disturbed and burdened with the Juba city council’s poor garbage management.
He said most of their houses are filled up with water as a result of garbage heaps blocking water ways citing that when it rains all their houses are fully filled with water, flies and bad stinking odor from the solid waste.
He noted that even the elderly people could not now sleep at home saying they are transferred to different places because of the water.
“The reason why the water is disturbing people at home is because the route where the water is supposed to pass through is closed, the garbage that people are throwing has blocked the entry routes of water,” the displeased resident said.
He called on the government to deploy a security sector to the location to at least stop the unnecessary dumping of waste in the residential areas that files up and cause blockage to water channels.
“If there is a sector (security force) in this place this waste will not be here and they have to see a place where the waste will be dumped either should be thrown in the cemetery and the sector is outside it or else another place where this waste can be dumped,” the resident appealed.
“It’s only the sector that I have seen that will help solve our problem in this area and if no urgent intervention this issue will kill people. The water could fill the whole compound up to inside the houses up to where the kitchen is and there is no place that people could cook in,” he added.
According to the reliable source, all the waste are being brought from the Konyo Konyo market especially the place where tomatoes are sold adding that those carrying and dumping the waste are those young street children loitering in the market that business women use them to dispose their garbage.
According to the concerned resident the garbage has been long piling up in the place since 2021.
Another resident who also declined to be named for personal reasons said that the garbage has given them a lot of challenges citing that during the regime of the former Mayor Kalisto Lado the garbage have always been removed but after the former mayor was removed the city council are no longer collecting the garbage.
She stated that the last time she could remember was that she stood on top of the heap of garbage and in the next morning all the garbage were all removed and the place became clean opening up the routes where the water could flow from as the water come and pass through the culvert.
“Now in the past month when the rain was not much we were not facing this kinds of challenges but because of the current rain things became difficult but during this month of August with the heavy rain all the channels are blocked at our side of the culvert, the water is entering but the other side of the road the waterways are blocked,” she revealed.
She said they went to city council authorities twice to the department of environment, requesting them to come to their help when their houses were all filled with water and their chairs, the bed were soaked in water.
The affected residents said they demanded the city council authorities clear the garbage and open the waterways but they failed to respond since then.
The anonymous source revealed that she had four children who felt sick due to the dirty water that had occupied her home and there was no where they could go. Efforts to reach the office of the Juba City Mayor Michael Lado Allah-Jabu for comment on the issue were not immediately successful by press time.