24 Jun 2014

Two private companies have resumed waste collection services in Gaborone West Phase one and Tsholofelo extensions.

Addressing the recent ordinary session of the Gaborone City Council (GCC), the mayor, Mr Haskins Nkaigwa said the companies resumed service on June 1 after signing contract with the council.

He said these companies had signed three-year contracts renewable annually for the next three years based on their performance.

Mayor Nkaigwa said GCC will however, continue to provide waste collection services in other parts of the city adding that now that the scope of work for Gaborone City Council had been reduced, it was expected that the waste management situation in the city would improve.

Mr Nkaigwa said the employees or council crews who used to service the outsourced areas have since been redeployed to other areas, thereby beefing up resources available for waste collection in those areas.

The mayor observed that that the two contractors started on a good note saying that despite being new on site, they managed to stick to their collection schedule.

He urged councillors and Gaborone City Council employees to support the companies so that they continue to render quality service. Mr Nkaigwa also reiterated the need for council to monitor, supervise and remunerate the companies accordingly.



Over and above, he explained that GCC is looking into possibilities of launching these companies in the near future, just to inform the communities about these companies and the companies’ expectations to facilitate a smooth service. 



Among the services provided by the companies include litter picking, removal of dead animals for proper disposal, house to house collection of residential waste and collection of waste from government institutions for proper disposal of the collected waste at Gamodubu Landfill.Waste from residential areas will be collected once a week.

The City Council will however issue job cards to facilitate collection of skips as and when they need to be serviced. Waste from commercial and industrial centers will not be covered by this initiative; therefore we should continue to encourage private entities to make their own arrangements for the collection and disposal of waste emanating from their operations, he said.

He further stated that despite all these developments, dumping of waste in open spaces and in the road reserves still persists. The mayor challenged Councillors to motivate their communities to help alleviate this problem because waste is generated by communities, and dumping is done by the same communities.

This session will discuss three motions and one of the motions that will be tabled on June 25 is that of Botswana Congress Party (BCP) Councillor Mr Ndawana Kenosi of Moselewapula ward in Gaborone West.

The motion will request the house to resolve that the Mayor (Mr Nkaigwa of Botswana Movement for Democracy (BMD) resign from his seat since it is now in the public domain that he has lost confidence on the people he is supposed to work with. The Botswana Democratic Party is in majority with 17 councillors, followed by BMD with nine, and BCP with seven. ENDS