Illegal and legal dumping

Thokozile Nkosi

The communities of Amajuba District are facing a problem of illegal dumping and even at the dumping sites, the waste is all over the skip bins. It happens in most of the places around the townships of (Madadeni, Danhouser, Osizweni, Mathukuza, and Newcastle) where the municipality does not have a proper plan for waste collection.

Almost all the locations of Osizweni (ebhareni) in Newcastle are affected by this dumping sites, whether it’s legal or not because in each street you find Littering even where there are these big bins. You will find it empty but the waste is all over the place or around it, sometimes you find it full for weeks. Little or no collection of waste is done by the municipality.

If there is no waste collection, most of the people who are affected are women and children because children go and play there and they will get sick with different diseases. Women have to take the kids to the clinic and in some instances they have no money for transport.

Women have to take kids to the clinic and also if the waste is not collected women get exposed, because they throw their sanitary pads into the bins. You find them lying everywhere and people start to call them names as if they are not responsible for such private stuff. Low self esteem starts to take place in our life’s as women’s.

This issue of the dumping sites has been there for quite a long time, but we don’t see anyone attending to it. The causes of this mushrooming of dumping sites.

1. Lack of awareness
2. Population growth
3. Lack of enough options
4. No proper workshops on the EPWP and CWP workers.

The municipality and the community must be responsible for these issues. What needs to be done is to create a community awareness on both illegal and legal dumping, and also approach the recycling and reuse companies. They must monitor bylaw enforcement and also create safe and public friendly waste disposal.