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Heather Charema Mashonaland West Correspondent
Kadoma residents have raised concern over failure by the local authority to collect refuse, raising fears of disease outbreak. A survey has shown that refuse was only being collected in the Central Business District, leaving out residential areas like Rimuka and Waverly. Residents have resorted to dumping refuse by the roadside. A Mornington resident, Mr Joseph Wagusiwa, said garbage had not been collected since 2016 in their area.

“Since 2016, we have not seen refuse trucks in Mornington and surrounding locations. We live very close to town, but our city council seems to have neglected us,” he said.

“We have resorted to dumping the refuse at our backyards, then burn it when possible. Since the birth of our child, we have always carried diapers from home to council bins where they can be properly disposed of. It is a health time bomb that can explode at any moment. Something has to be done because the whole city is prone to contracting diseases.”

Mr Stanley Ngwenya of Waverly suburb said Kadoma City Council had not collected refuse for the past year and people in all locations were dumping garbage on roadsides.

“It’s been a year since refuse has been collected in Waverly and Rimuka, so we all dump garbage by roadsides. They collect garbage weekly on Tuesdays in the CBD, yet more garbage is found in the locations where they do not come,” he said.

Kadoma City health and environmental services director Mr Daniel Chirundu said council’s refuse trucks were broken down.

“Our refuse trucks are not operating, so we are collecting refuse in the CBD only. As soon as we finish repairing them, the situation will return to normal. Right now, we are experiencing constant breakdowns on our three refuse trucks and we managed to order the spare parts, but they turned out to be the wrong ones,” he said.

Mr Chirundu said the spare parts arrived before Christmas, but had to be returned after they turned out to be the wrong ones. Kadoma, he said, was expecting more spare parts for the trucks from South Africa. Mr Chirundu assured residents that the situation would soon improve.