Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality’s new Cleaning and Greening project has turned its focus to Motherwell, where illegal dumping sites in all nine wards will be cleared and developed for better future use.
On Monday, 13 June 2022, the City and its partners cleaned the illegal dumping site in NU12 next to the Mfesane High School in Ward 54, where tons of illegally dumped waste caused health concerns for the community and hundreds of pupils from the school.
The Cleaning and Greening programme aims to eradicate the crisis of illegal dumping across the City.
During the clean-up, Ward 54 Councillor Lunga Minyayo urged all residents to work with the Municipality to change the waste management crisis and redevelop NMB to be clean again.
“We are very happy that this programme is in our ward today for at least two days as cleaning the dirt will not take one day. Port Elizabeth used to be the cleanest city and it is quite worrying that as a City named after the late President Nelson Mandela, who was one of the neatest people, we are faced with this challenge. Part of this programme is to make sure that we also educate our people, from the young to the old, to change the way they see and handle waste,” said Minyayo.
Public Health Portfolio Head, Cllr Thsonono Buyeye, encouraged residents to join the clean-up campaigns and take ownership of their spaces.
“Since we launched the programme in Wells Estate and KwaZakhele recently, it has been going well, residents are supporting it, and they seem keen to work with us to change the situation.
Later this week (15 and 17 June), we will be working in Ward 55, which is also in Motherwell and progressing to other areas from there. The education part of the programme is critical as we need changed behaviour after we have left; otherwise, the programme will not be sustainable,” said Buyeye.
