Hostel Dwellers Upset With Illegal Waste Dumping In Their Premises

Some residents of the Actonville hostel in Benoni are upset with the unbecoming conduct of illegal waste dumping by their fellow residents.

Mlamuli Ngwenya is a resident at Actonville hostel and is concerned about the ongoing illegal dumping of skeleton cow heads thrown all over the hostel premises.

“There are people who run small businesses here selling food. However, their conduct is now getting out of hand. They are refusing to use the 240L wheelie bins provided by the municipality as they use them as storage facility inside their houses. They also do not want to use refuse bags and skip bins to contain and throw away their waste,” Ngwenya said.

Mlamuli Ngwenya has been staying at the hostel for years and he is not against people running their small businesses, however, he wants them to respect their residential space by keeping it clean. Ngwenya says he has reported this issue to the authorities before, but the problem persists.

“This garbage draws insects and lives a foul smell,” Ngwenya added.

The city’s officials in the department of waste management services are aware of the situation and they constantly clean up the area as per the dedicated calendar days of waste removal services.

However, Baba Mtshali, a vendor selling pap and cow head says they usually place the skeleton cow heads on the sun to dry-up and they create wooden spoons from the dried bones to re-sell them. That is why they are usually left to dry on the ground, unfortunately other people see it as illegal dumping, but for me it’s a way of survival.

The city’s officials have conducted waste management educational campaigns inside the hostel on the dangers of illegal dumping and have advised hostel dwellers to report illegal dumping to the city’s call centre on 0860 543 000 and a fine will be enforced on those found to be on the wrong side of the law.

Caption:

Pic 1: Illegally dumped cow heads at the Actonville hostel in Benoni.