Agency begins massive evacuation of refuse across Lagos

The Lagos State Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) has begun a massive evacuation of refuse across the state. Commissioner for the Environment, Dr. Samuel Babatunde Adejare, who disclosed this yesterday, explained that LAWMA was mobilized to cart away the backlog of refuse generated during the Christmas and New Year celebrations.

According to him, the government was aware of challenges before LAWMA and was addressing it with the new sanitation initiative, tagged the Cleaner Lagos Initiative (CLI) with the projection to inject technology and resources into waste management through Public Private Partnership in 2017.

Consequent upon the new initiative, LAWMA will face solely its regulatory role to bring about efficient control and monitoring of the emergent and old private players in the sector.

Adejare assured Lagosians of the commitment of the Akinwunmi Ambode Administration to cleaner and sustainable environment, saying LAWMA was on top of the situation as it had since commenced the carting away of the backlog especially in Surulere, Igando, Ikotun, Egbeda, Ogba, Agege, Ikeja and other parts of the state.

He stated that in order to ensure the backlog of waste from the festive celebrations was mopped up on time, LAWMA and its men had been working overnight and would soon restore normalcy.

Reinforcing the new initiative, the state government through the Commissioner of Information, Mr. Steve Ayorinde, has announced a plan to create over 25,000 direct jobs, which in turn, will produce indirect jobs for two percent of its entire population over the next few years with the implementation of new environmental policies and procedures.

According to Commissioner of Information, Mr. Steve Ayorinde, the idea of the Cleaner Lagos Initiative (CLI) is to create value and empower those at the bottom of the value chain. It would allow citizens to be a part of the solution by taking responsibility for their immediate environment, while solving the challenge of poor waste management in their communities.

“The benefits of a mass employment scheme such as this unprecedented effort tie back directly to the Lagos State government’s sustainability goals towards improving environmental and socio-economic conditions for its citizens.

“The CLI will employ 25,000 community sanitation workers (CSW) who will be engaged mostly as street sweepers within the next 12 months. Every sanitation worker will reside in the ward they operate for convenience and to curb high cost of transportation to work. They will be well trained and given an attractive compensation package.”