Jeddah: New procedures for sad state of garbage collection

Cleaners in many cities carry out their duties with negligence and laziness, perhaps even begging. Many pick up waste that can conveniently be recycled, such as cans and remnants of copper wire. Such an attitude is what distracts them from performing the tasks assigned to them. Many of them argue that this attitude and low work ethic is due to low salaries and non-payment of dues on time, which makes many of them negligent in their work. Meanwhile, waste containers have became overloaded with household waste and have become a breeding ground for armies of flies and seasonal insects. A reporter from a local newspaper set out to monitor several neighborhoods in many cities, capturing by camera the accumulation of waste in many internal streets. The first site was Tabuk, where some have explained that eight districts in the city have been experiencing an accumulation of waste for the past month. This has made young people in these neighborhoods head out to clean the streets themselves. The people living in the districts of Al-Rawdah, Al-Nahah, Al-Qadisiyah, Al-Worod, Al-Solimaniah, Al-Montazah and Sultanah all complain of overcrowding waste in front of their homes, which has not been removed by the company responsible for cleaning. Gleaned from conversations with people in some neighborhoods, more than a month has passed without the presence of cleaners and with the complete absence of any solutions by the Municipality. This has made people in some neighborhoods initiate cleaning the streets themselves in order to remove accumulated waste which, according to them, became unbearable. The president of the Municipal Council in the region of Tabuk, Jamal Al-Fakhiri, stated that there are contracts that have been signed with 3 new companies for cleaning the city of Tabuk, pointing out that the companies have not begun their work until now because of problems in their contracts, which he expects to be resolved soon. He added that the secretariat of the Tabuk region is currently exerting tremendous efforts by using the garbage compressors of the provinces and the vehicles of the municipality, which are not specialized in the transport of waste in order to meet the existing deficit. Fakhiri promised to end this problem in the near future, noting that the vehicles of the new companies will be of modern style. The tour witnessed the absence of hygiene in the back streets and central neighborhoods in a large number of residential neighborhoods of Taif, while the main streets looked clean. A large number of people living in the districts of Al-Washah, Al-Sohaily, north and south Sohada, Al-Nozha. as well as other neighborhoods, demanded the concerned authorities to find appropriate solutions quickly to save Taif from the risk of being piled up with the waste spreading in the residential neighborhoods. An official source at the secretariat of Taif stated that one of the company’s contracts was terminated in the previous period, and new companies have been contracted. He added that there is a plan to clean the streets of Taif, stressing that the new budget would end the suffering of the population about the absence of hygiene in the streets. In Madinah, a number of cleaners claimed that the work contracts they signed with the company was not actually implemented, as they do not get paid on time, thus making many of the workers careless in their work and motivating them to seek alternate jobs to increase their income, such as loading and unloading goods in the shops and working at carwashes. Said Joel Khan, he works eight hours a day cleaning the main streets in a residential neighborhood for a salary of 250 riyals per month plus a renewal of his iqama and guaranteed free housing; however, since he does not receive his salary on time, he looks to other available work available, such as loading and unloading goods in shops and private residences, and washing cars for citizens. Meanwhile, Abdullah Younis, deputy director of the company entrusted with the cleanliness of the city’s neighborhoods, explained that there are minor issues, all of which have been resolved. These minor issues, he added, and the lack of cleaners have no effect on the level of cleanliness in the city because it is follows certain plans, and the city and its neighborhoods are thankfully clean, as everyone can witness. In other neighborhoods south of Jeddah, garbage is piling up across several streets, forming a pyramid of waste bags, and emitting many different odors surrounding the containers. Such a pile up of garbage is causing inhabitants of these poorer areas plenty of harm, especially in the absence of the cleaners. During a visit to the neighborhoods of AlSharafiya, Al Sabeel, Al Handawiya, and Ghalil, waste was accumulated in amounts so great that one is forced to evacuate the area due to the undesirable odors emitted by the decomposing waste. On this matter, the official media spokesman for the Jeddah Municipality, Dr Abdulaziz Al Nahari, indicated that often, the amount of waste more than capacity of the compressors. He revealed that a new contract has been agreed upon with a cleaning company that would work exclusively in neighborhoods in the south of Jeddah. He also revealed that the site will be handed over to the company within the next two months, although this does not mean that there will be a halt to the cleaning process. Said Al-Nahari, “it is impossible for waste to remain for more than three months, but there was in fact an issue with one of the cleaning companies, and this issue was quickly resolved.” On the other hand, the secretariat of the Holy City of Makkah has contained the hygiene crisis, which was huge in the recent period, through specifications as well as specific controls and mechanisms distributed to all districts of the Holy City. The Director General of Cleanliness in the city’s secretariat, Engineer Mohammed Al-Mawarki, stated that “the secretariat of the Holy City opened the file of poor hygiene in the recent period and studied the dimensions of this problem in order to avoid repeating it, noting that 200 workers had been transferred to the concerned authorities for investigation because they were inciting workers to stop performing of their duties.” From Arab news