By Hassan I. Conteh

The oldest but now very small in size, Waterloo waste site, is yet to be moved far away to a mass landfill in the rural in spite of talks by district council authorities.

”There have been much efforts done recently to transfer it to Newton (known also as 4 mile community) but I think council had stopped due to the presence of the  rainy season,” says Abass, a caretaker of the dumping site in Central Waterloo.

”The bumeh is not like how it was.

It’s different now as you can see. The dirt does not spillover the main streets like it was in the past recent years.”

Surely, a zinc perimeter fence has been erected around the ‘bumeh’. Now, it is difficult to see huge rubbish on the street which causes motor blockage.

But, there is more to do. The waste site is located on a swampy area, something which results to the soil loosening out due to the overwheming weight of the rubbish.

The ‘old bumeh’ in Central Waterloo like the one at Ackram around Ferry Junction in Freetown, should be moved away  to open landfills suitably in the countryside.

The two major waste sites in the urban areas have stretched out beyond their limits.

They could no longer serve urban centres’ growing population.

The east of Freetown where Ackram bumeh is around Ferry junction has very huge  population than the west.

There are also major plenty markets and more factories  in the east of the capital Freetown.

Here, peoples’ daily activities are causing the waste site to quickly swell up with dirt that mostly becomes uncontrollable.

Environmentalists say human congestion and overcrowded waste sites could affect people well-being.

Domesticated animals could also be severely affected by open dumping grounds which are left so careless.

This could cause diseases to be easily transfered from persons to persons and sometimes from animals to persons.

To prevent humans from catching diseases, the World Bank in Sierra Leone had over the past two years promised huge funds to ensure the Ackram bumeh in Freetown be relocated elesewhere particularly on the outskirts of the capital.

A similar plan was also expressed by the district council in Waterloo to relocate the central bumeh in Waterloo to another place.

Waterloo is in the Western Area Rural district.

It was not clear, however; whether the World Bank included Waterloo dumping ground to be built elsewhere at the time of an interview with an official at Western Area Rural District Council in around June 2021.

But, the senior staff at the Western Area Rural District in Waterloo confirmed that by the end of that year the dumping site would have been relocated ouside Waterloo.

But since then, the time is long overdue.

Seriously, people are concerned as parts of the bumeh in Waterloo were being sold off to business investors, further squeezing out the very now smaller land portion of the dumping site which is  serving a population of over 1 million.

And residents of Waterloo are still kept in the dark as what else are the next moves by authorities on the dumping ground.

Africa24, while doing this investigation, had tried to get responses from Council officials on what has caused the several delays to moving the bumeh off Waterloo but to no avail.