How private sector participation is changing refuse evacuation in Kano

Disturbed by the menace the unsanitary situation posed, some individuals decided to complement government efforts by setting up private refuse evacuation companies. The companies place drums in front of houses into which refuse is emptied and at the end of the week, these are evacuated and disposed of by the companies. Under this arrangement, an interested customer pays a fee of N1000 or less for the service.
Though the initiative is helping to reduce indiscriminate refuse dumping in the state, but attendant challenges are forcing some of the companies to dump the business. The challenges, according to some of the companies, include non-payment by customers and lack of motivation from the government.
Daily Trust discovered that out of the over 80 companies that registered for the business, only about half are functioning.
Alhaji Yahya Suleiman Yakasai, owner of Annazafatu Clean said he started the refuse evacuation business seven years ago and is doing well. He, however, noted that those in the business could only make it when there is patience. “This business is for people that are patient because despite the importance of the service, people are not encouraging us,” he said.
“You can evacuate refuse for a person for over a year but he will not pay you and will be giving excuses anytime he is contacted over the payment,”
He said when he started the business, he did not have a single vehicle to evacuate refuse to disposal sites, but hired a van to work with, adding however that after he accessed a loan from a bank, he purchased three vans for the refuse collection and disposal service.
Alhaji Yakasai said he has about nine permanent staff and many casuals working under him who he pays on a daily basis, depending on the number of drums evacuated by each staff.
According to him, the business is one that could be started without big capital. “I started by first seeking the opinion of the people around; that is if they would want such service and they indicated interest. I did not have money to buy a vehicle for the business but I started by buying drums to place in front of the house of each person that wanted it and at the end of the week, I would hire a van to evacuate it. We evacuate four times in a month and we were charging only N500 then until government decided to increase the fee to N1,000.”
He further revealed that most of their customers were the elite, saying the common people were yet to appreciate and see the need for the service.
Asked what they do with the refuse after evacuation, he said they just threw it away. “We just throw it away. But there was a time when we sifted through to collect metal and plastic materials which we take to companies for recycling. Though we were getting money out of the waste, lack of space would not allow us to continue,” he said.
On challenges, Yakasai who is a civil servant said people were not paying and government was not assisting them. “The main challenge is that people are not paying but we are still doing it patiently. And again, we receive no support from the government; this is despite the interest shown by the governor. He was personally attending our meetings but along the line some people in the government blocked the way for us.”
He added that if government could purchase waste crushing vehicles and give them as loan that would help in boosting their operation.
He also decried the area allocation system introduced by Refuse Management and Sanitation Board (REMASAB), which, he said, is restricting a particular company to a certain area only, saying let the market be a free one so that each company would try its luck.
On his part, the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Attaqwa Global Concept Nigeria Ltd, Aminu Ahmad Attaqawa, one of the companies that started the refuse evacuation business but later abandoned it, said non-payment of fees by residents made him dump the business. “People are not paying. You would park a person’s refuse for months, at least four times every month, but he will not pay you even for two months,” he said.
He added that apart from the payment problem, one other major constraint he faced was where to dump the refuse after evacuation. He said government did not provide a specific site for the dumping of refuse and sometimes they were arrested by staff of  REMASAB.
He said the agency contributed greatly in frustrating their effort, adding that instead of appreciating and assisting them, the agency is frustrating them and pushing them out of the business.
“Government is supposed to appreciate what we are doing as obtained in other states but not to frustrate us because government alone cannot evacuate all the refuse scattered across the state,” he said.
Further checks by Daily Trust revealed that many people are still not aware of the private initiative, attributing it to lack of publicity by the operators and the government agency responsible.
Malama Asabe of Gadon Kaya, in Gwale Local Government Area said she had never heard of it until now, stressing that it would be difficult for the common people to accept the initiative because very few among them would afford to pay N1,000 at the end of every month.
Malam Isa Muhammad on his part said some of the companies were not so effective in their operations, saying though he had deposited some money with one of the companies to provide the drum at his house, it is now more than two months but he has not seen any.
Efforts to speak to officials of the Kano State Ministry of Environment failed as they are not picking their calls.