Govt. wants a health crisis in City - Mayor Green

Govt. wants a health crisis in City – Mayor Green

Dec 30, 2010 News

“…Champion of the Earth should’ve volunteered assistance”

The current take-over of the city dumpsite by the administration must be viewed in the context of the recent statement by Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, Kellawan Lall, that he would be glad for a health crisis in the City as a result of the garbage pile up.
This is according to City Mayor, Hamilton Green, who said that the government wanted the situation to get to a crisis level.
He said that he has been pleading with the administration for assistance for a long time.
He even chided Minister of Transport and Hydraulics, Robeson Benn, who during a recent visit to the site, lamented the inaction of the council as it relates to the management of the dumpsite.
Green said that Benn’s comments are “unfortunate if not dishonest.”
He reiterated that the Council is short of money and equipment. “We lack the money and machines…This is what the public should know.”
At present there are two extra bulldozers and excavators which the Government brought in the day after Mark Benschop and Freddie Kissoon were arrested for protesting the situation at the dumpsite.
“If you go back to Lall’s statement that he would be glad if there is a health crisis …it has to be seen in that context.”
Green pointed out that when it was realized that they would not be getting the Haags Bosch site at the time they had expected, the Mayor met with Minister Lall and impressed on him that they did not budget for that reality.
He said that it was explained at that time that with the then impending Christmas season there would have been an onslaught on the dumpsite. The council would not have been able to adequately handle the situation, given its limitations.
Green lamented that there has been no formal response to the council even about the government takeover which he has had to read about in the press. But the government now says that it has not taken over the Mandela dumpsite, that it is merely managing the site.
The City Mayor said that when there was hint of a Government takeover he had written to the administration asking for a clarification but this has not happened to date according to the Mayor.
Green said that it is pathetic, the manner in which the Government operates. The President who is the ‘Champion of the Earth’ “should have come and asked us what we need” to handle the garbage crisis in the City, he added.
“Now I hear (Dr Roger) Luncheon saying that the new site at Haags Bosch will not be ready for January.”
Mayor Green said that in
the interim what they can do is to pile the garbage higher. They can’t expand to the sides, he added.
Green said that the facility should have been closed ever since 1997, adding that he had wanted an incinerator but the funding was unavailable.
He said that the money for the new site did not allow for the council to do any rehabilitation. He wanted to erect a perimeter fence so that the council could keep persons out but there was no money.
“What Lall said should be stressed…they want a crisis,” Green reiterated. Lall, in July said that he would be glad if there is a health crisis in the city. “Well, if there is a health crisis in the city, I would be glad, because it would remove the City Council…They’ll be responsible for it,” Lall told reporters when questioned about a potential health crisis in the city over garbage that had been piling up for the weeks as a result of the fact that the waste disposal contractors had stopped collection because the council was unable to pay them.