Bujumbura: Towards becoming city of waste?

Bujumbura residents complain these days that their solid wastes are no longer removed from their houses. Bags are deposited in different corners and streets of the capital Bujumbura. “We don’t know the reasons behind the delay in collecting them. The company in charge of removing wastes has just spent five months without doing its job,” says a resident of Bwiza neighborhood in the capital Bujumbura.

Bujumbura city mayor: “Buterere dump is saturated with wastes”

Bwiza residents accuse Bujumbura Cleaning Company (BCCO) in charge of removing the solid wastes of being unable to do its job. “They only come to collect money without removing wastes”, says another resident. She says inhabitants of the neighborhood pay either BIF 1000 or BIF 2000 to someone who collects the wastes to deposit them on the streets. “Those wastes give off foul smell and can cause diseases to the population,” she says.

Patrice Magnus Nyandwi, Spokesperson for BCCO, says the delay in removing wastes from houses is due to a small number of people who signed the contract with us in some localities. “Only 2% of Bwiza residents made a contract with our company. We can’t dispatch our trucks to remove solid wastes for such a handful of people unless we want to go bankrupt,” he says.

Freddy Mbonimpa, Bujumbura Mayor, says the Buterere dump has been saturated with wastes since the past two weeks. “There is no more place for solid wastes,” he says. He also says the trucks in charge of collecting the solid wastes in the capital Bujumbura belonging to the Municipal Technical Services-SETEMU are no longer functional. Mr Mbonimpa says Bujumbura city plans to identify a provisional dump in Muha Commune while waiting for the wastes to be dumped. “It is a problem that was caused by machines’ failure. We hope that the situation will work out as soon as possible,” he says.

On 17 October, the Mayor of Bujumbura released a list of more than 10 associations and cooperatives that won the market to dispose of solid wastes in two communes of the capital Bujumbura. The Bujumbura Cleaning Company, which had won the monopoly to remove all solid wastes in the capital, had failed to honor its contract.