SOME franchise companies engaged to be collecting waste in Lusaka do not have the necessary equipment and human capital which has rendered them effective and inefficient in their business of managing waste, the Lusaka City Council has disclosed.
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Lusaka Mayor Chilando Chitangala has revealed that the council is now aware that some companies that were engaged for waste management in fact lacked the necessary equipment for them to be able to manage waste effectively.
Ms Chitangala said all the wards had companies that were supposed to collect garbage but the challenge had been that some of the companies lacked the proper machinery and human resource because they lied their way to being awarded contracts.
“As the Lusaka City Council, we have made sure that there is a waste collection in all the wards but the challenge has been that some of the franchise entities do not have the necessary equipment and manpower to do the work. This is because when they were getting the contracts, they pretended as if they had everything when in fact not,” Ms Chitangala said.
Ms Chitangala said the lack of appropriate equipment by some of the contractors had resulted into some areas in the city go for weeks without having their waste collected because the companies in those areas did not have the equipment to ensure the timely collection of waste.
Ms Chitangala said the contracts for the current companies, most of which lacked appropriate equipment are expiring next month and the Council would be engaging new contractors in waste management.
‘’We are going to make sure that the franchise companies we will engage after next month show proof of their equipment and human resource because, now, we are more aware and we will do things differently,” Ms Chitangala said.
Ms Chitangala said companies prospecting to be engaged in the management of waste should prove to the council that they had the ability by having all the necessary machinery and human resource.
She said the lack of equipment and human resource by the companies had put the council in bad light as some stakeholders tended to think the local authority was failing in the management of waste.
She said: “We have people who say Lusaka City Council has failed to manage waste all because of the franchise companies who do not have the machinery and man power. But going forward, that is not something we will condone when we start awarding contracts’.
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