Thugs mount ‘toll gate’ at Chunga dumpsite

LINDA SOKO TEMBO writes  UNSCRUPULOUS people at Chunga dumpsite have started charging entry fees to collect solid waste, some waste pickers have complained. The waste pickers have expressed unhappiness that it was no longer free for them to go into the Chunga Landfill and that they now needed to pay a K3.00 for access to rummage through the garbage piles in search of recyclable materials.  In separate interviews with The Sun, the solid waste pickers were saddened that a group of youths had teamed up, and was charging them money to pick solid waste, and they were not representing any institution.  One of the waste pickers Elizabeth Naposya said they had no idea where the group came from and made up their own rules to be charging them K3.00 per day to collect solid waste from the dumpsite.   Ms Naposya: Kuno ku Chunga dumpsite tiliko na problem batisokesandalama anyamata citiziba nakwamene ziyeda ndalama. [Here at Chungadumpsite, we have a problem, they are asking for money but we don’t know where it is going.] Everyday badimanda ma K3.00 kuti tigene mu dumpsite. Bamakamba atitinakumeyilani nkhondo. Manji ife nkhondo yamene bana menya sintiziba. [Everyday, they demand K3 for us to enter the dumpsite. The claim they fought for us but we don’t where or who they fought.] They are found at the gate and outside the Chunga dumpsite wall fence and everyone who is found inside has to pay a K3.00 every day. Ba council sibakamba vilivonse tavutika.  And another waste collector Rhoda Mulenga appealed to government authorities to intervene to stop the youths collecting money from them by force.  Ms Mulenga further urged government to also help them with Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) to protect themselves from corona viruses as they collected solid waste at the dumpsite as that was the only source of their livelihood. The Sun