South Sudan Ministry of Environment and Forestry has on Tuesday launched the city cleaning campaign week to mark the World Environment Month.
The campaign began at Juba International Airport where it was officiated by the undersecretary in the ministry.
“If we want to be proud of our country, we have to make it clean,” Joseph Africano said.
Mr. Africano called on the public, government and private institutions to protect the environment through proper waste disposal and sanitation.
“They say dirty streets, dirty residential areas reflect the politic of the country; that’s mean the politic is dirty and corrupt,” he added.
Cecilia Mogga, the Deputy Director in the Directorate of Environment Management described poor waste disposal in South Sudan as a threat to public health.
“Our environment is damaged, and it’s a man-made problem – which we do intentionally. If you look at what surrounds us all, we can see a lot of rubbish because we are not concerned and in this, tomorrow we hear about cholera, diarrhoea, malaria, vomiting and typhoid…because of environmental problem.”
Recently, the Juba City Council contracted the East Africa Go Green company to manage waste in the city.
The company’s Managing Director, Goaner Timothy Tulam said they have identified designated locations in the residentials for people of Juba to pile garbage for pick ups.
“Waste management starts with individual responsibility…our role is not to clean the city, it’s to collect, transport, and manage the waste at the dumping site. We are not responsible for cleaning your area and your house,” he stated.
Mr. Goaner further urged residents of Juba to observe the four pillars of effective waste management – which include; individual mindset, consciousness, capacity to transport, collection and waste management.
The launch of the clean city campaign was to attract people from various sectors – with today being a holiday in South Sudan. The President on Monday declared three days of mourning in honor of the late Minister Manawa Peter Gatkuoth.
Daniel Mwaka, the Executive Director of Youth Empowerment Organization said he expected a large turnout of young people to help with the cleaning campaign.
“Now we are given opportunity to come and clean the environment and we are not turning up and later when something goes wrong, we blame the government…we are supposed to seize this opportunity and…show our responsibility to the country and to our city to make it very clean,” he stressed.
The Ministry of Environment and Forestry said this week is dedicated to the cleaning campaign under the theme; “Save environment, ‘save lives’ to mark the world environmental month.”
June 5 is observed annually to mark the World Environment Day.