The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | URN | Despite thousands of residents participating in the nationwide cleanup exercise, piles of mixed waste remained along major roads and trading centres, raising concerns about public health and KCCA’s capacity to handle the unusually large volumes of garbage generated during the campaign.
On Namungona–Kasubi Road and Hoima Road, several heaps of waste were still lying by the roadside on Sunday. At Kasubi Market, more than four large piles remained near vendors operating along the road. Similar scenes were observed in Nankulabye, Makerere Kikoni, Kawala, Kagugube, Kamwokya, and Kyebando.
Responding to growing public complaints online, Buzeki assured residents that KCCA teams were still working around the clock to clear the accumulated waste.
“Thank you all for the feedback on the places that have not yet been cleared. We are still in the field evacuating waste until the last pack of garbage reaches Buyala Waste Management Site. Continue giving us feedback on areas that have not been cleared for our teams to move there,” she posted o X.
In another update, she appealed for precise locations from residents. “Most areas were cleared throughout the night,” she said. “If your area has not yet been cleared, please share the exact location so our trucks can be dispatched to collect the garbage. Our teams have been on the ground throughout the night and are still working to evacuate garbage across the city.”
The online engagement saw dozens of residents report uncleared garbage from different parts of the city, effectively turning social media into a real-time reporting platform for waste collection.
In Makerere Kikoni on Hajji Ssebuliba Road, Julius Byamukama, a boda boda rider, said residents and riders responded to the government’s call and cleaned the area on Saturday, piling the waste beside their stage in anticipation that KCCA trucks would collect it before the end of the day.
However, they returned on Sunday to find the garbage still intact. Byamukama said the unsorted waste had produced a foul smell, forcing riders to temporarily abandon their stage until it is collected.
He believes the delayed collection exposed inadequate planning for the nationwide exercise, arguing that the volume of waste generated overwhelmed KCCA’s capacity.
In Kamwokya Market, Kyebando and neighbouring areas, garbage heaps also remained scattered along roadsides, markets and residential areas late into Sunday.
Quinto Okethwengu, Chairperson of the Alur Community in Kamwokya, said the accumulated waste had created a stronger stench than before the cleanup when it had been concentrated into large piles.
He said his efforts to contact KCCA for collection had not yielded results. Okethwengu argued that regular deployment of garbage trucks would enable residents to manage waste more effectively in markets, homes and public spaces.
Amid the criticism, KCCA announced that it had strengthened its waste collection fleet through partner support.
In a statement issued Sunday, the Authority said it had received nine new 40-tonne Sino trucks, with two allocated to each of Lubaga, Makindye and Kawempe divisions, while Nakawa received three.
KCCA also said Nabugabo Updeal Venture had deployed an additional 15 trucks to support waste collection in the Central Division.
The Authority attributed the slow clearance partly to congestion at Buyala Waste Management Facility.
“Due to the large volumes of waste and heavy traffic from Kampala and its metropolitan area at the Buyala Waste Management Facility, offloading times are longer, which stretches the turnaround time,” the statement said.
The delayed collection has prompted renewed calls for increased investment in urban waste management.
Nubian Li, the Nakawa Division Mayor said residents had fulfilled their responsibility during the cleanup campaign, but government needed to strengthen waste collection infrastructure.
“Citizens did their part for the national cleanup, but piles of trash are still sitting uncollected in our streets. This is a massive public health hazard waiting to happen. The government needs to invest more in garbage trucks and waste infrastructure,” he said.
During the launch of National Cleaning Day on Saturday, Vice President Jessica Alupo acknowledged the challenges facing local governments in waste management and said government was mobilizing resources to procure more garbage collection equipment, including trucks for local governments, to improve waste collection and disposal during future cleanup exercises.
Hello Members,
I think for the Gabbage, lets ask Organizations, Companies and well wishers with Vehicles to volunteer their vehicles to take away these cabbage heaped allover the city to be dumped before it causes problems beyong the General Cleaning exercise
The very Citizens who should be volunteering their tricks and vehicles to carry away the heaps of collected garbage were physically assaulted by security personnel during the cleaning campaign. May be next time KCCA should conduct such civil campaigns without physically assaulting and abusing citizens then we’ll all work as a Team for a common good.
In addition to mounds of rubble everywhere left by government workers who never clean up after themselves when digging up manholes and pipes etc, we also have a very serious problem of open sewage… nobody wants to touch kasasiro that’s mixed up with raw sewage, and that’s one main reason why kasasiro piles up.
Honestly, no amount of citizen action can replace government’s responsibility… we cannot fix sewage leakages, we cannot close open manholes where kasasiro collects…
Imagine, Ugandans turned up in numbers to clean up on Saturday but we still have piles of kasasiro on the road still waiting for collection four days later… no amount of citizen action can replace government’s responsibility.
And by the way, as tax payers these are services we are supposed to be getting.
These are employment opportunities being taken away by national cleaning day – the unemployed (especially those without education, qualifications and without experience) are supposed to be paid to do this work… elections were not that long ago, unemployment and job creation are still burning issues, remember??
Yet on top of paying taxes that are supposed to cover these services, we still pay kasasiro companies to clean up, and now we are also being forced to spend 3 hours once a month cleaning up other people’s kasasiro… only for gavumenti to ignore all the piles of kasasiro generated on national cleaning day.
Have you noticed the sudden upsurge of rats roaming around since the national cleaning day?
Since kasasiro is a health hazzard, supposing people decide to burn the kasasiro that gavumenti has failed to collect?
Gavumenti just needs to step their game up, that’s all.
Thinking this was a good initiative. Let’s learn from the mistake that happened this time and government will pull up socks next time. At least we look cleaner now