Kidero bets on Sh27 billion garbage plant to boost reelection bid
City Hall will start building a multi-billion garbage recycling plant in the next six months, a signature project that Governor Evans Kidero hopes will energize his reelection campaign.
Appearing on Cheche Live show on Citizen Television on Wednesday, Governor Kidero said the Sh27 billion garbage recycling plant will help rid the city of garbage.
“We are working on this issue with strategic partners who have promised to build a 270 million Euros recirculation plant with the construction set to start within the next six months,” said Dr Kidero.
Currently, Nairobi is choking in garbage with the city’s largest dumping site in Dandora reeling under the weight of excessive solid waste.
It is holding over 1.8 million tons of waste against an expected capacity of 500, 000 tons.
Heaps of uncollected garbage lie in neighbourhoods across affluent suburbs and informal settlements.
LACK OF STRATEGY
Governor Kidero, who has been at the helm for four years, defended himself against criticism of lacking a strategy for sustained garbage collection.
He explained that when he was elected governor in 2013, the city had about 2.2 tons of garbage in both city streets and residential areas.
He said he contracted private garbage collectors to cleanup the city and increased the number of lorries collecting garbage from 13 to 90.
“I did not know the dynamics then but now I know and we are collecting more garbage with over 2, 200 tons being collected every day,” he said.
WASTE MANAGEMENT LAW
He said that the county had also passed a law on solid waste management to rein on unregulated garbage collectors who used to dump garbage in undesignated places
“Every person produces at least a half a kilogram of garbage every day and so garbage collection is a continuous process,” he said.
Dr Kidero said that the planned relocation of Dandora dumpsite to Ruai would not go ahead because of challenges arising from the identified site being in a flight path.
“Ruai was identified but has not been implemented because of its potential bird strikes as it is on a flight path,” explained Kidero.