Kidero seeks joint venture with Army, NYS in handling Nairobi garbage

Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero (centre) during his visit to the Dondora dump site yesterday. Nairobi county government will extend the life of the dump site as a short-term solution to managing city garbage. [PHOTO: DAVID NJAAGA]

KENYA: Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero will from Monday next week meet with engineers from the Ministry of Works, the Army and the National Youth Service to work on modalities of prolonging the life of Dandora dump site for another five years.

The governor plans to have the dump site, which takes one million tonnes of waste annually, compacted so as to create space for more garbage before relocating it to Ruai.

This came as the County Environment Chief Officer Leah Oyake resigned over the piling of garbage across the city, and the garbage payment scam that has rocked county hall.

There has been an uproar over growing piles of uncollected garbage in the city despite payments being made.

Officials at City Hall said Ms Oyake was forced out of office over what was seen as laxity in her department in cleaning the city, with Dr Kidero citing cartels and corruption as the major challenge.

"I am resigning as a result of frustrations in my department. There has been individuals plotting for my downfall, and I find no other choice but to step aside," she stated.

During a site visit and clean up exercise at the Dandora dump site yesterday, Kidero said he would be engaging relevant engineers such as the army to ensure that the waste is moved and compacted to allow for more space.

"Dandora dump site has never been compacted. Starting Monday, we are going to embark on a new scientific solution to ensure we prolong its life to another five more years," he said.

He further revealed that a German-based company, EMC Solutions, had been contracted to the tune of Sh28 billion to come up with an energy generating plant, which will be using the waste as the raw material.

City Hall has since December contracted NYS to assist with garbage collection for 45 days at Sh1 million daily.

Before her resignation, Oyake said the cleaning exercise of Dandora was a joint initiative between the county government and NYS.

She said the county has been doing similar cleaning work in other slums such as Kibera and Mukuru Kwa Njenga for the past 13 days.

"NYS has provided us with two bulldozers, three excavators and eight tippers. Additionally, the county government has provided for six excavators, two bull dozers and two tippers," said Oyake.