Lagos Assembly dares Ambode, orders PSP operators to resume refuse collection

Lagos State House of Assembly on Thursday ordered Private Sector Partnership (PSP) operators in all the 20 Local Governments and 37 Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs) of the state to resume refuse collection and disposal with immediate effect.

The PSP operators had been disengaged by the state governor Akinwunmi Ambode following the introduction of a new environmental initiative, through the Visionscape Sanitation Solution Limited.

Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Mudashiru Obasa, gave the order during a plenary sitting where the lawmakers debated the state of sanity in the state’s environment.

“We are calling on the 20 local governments and 37 LCDAs in the state to have meetings with the PSP operators to go back to work and they should start paying them and make the residents to start paying the operators. We have to avoid epidemics and be proactive.”

The speaker who disregarded the emergence of Visionscape stated that the legislative arm of the state government was not consulted before the executive approved Visionscape’s operation in the state.

Since Visionscape took over refuse management, there had been a public outcry of the company’s incompetence, leading to dirt being dumped at public places in the state.

“We insist that we don’t know anything about Visionscape because we were not consulted before they started work,” Obasa said.

“We once wrote the Commissioner for Finance, Hon. Akinyemi Ashade not to pay Visionscape again and he sould return any money he paid to them after our instruction to the coffers of the state government. We will go to that when the time comes, but we have to do the needful now.”

Obasa insisted that the House ought to have approved the new refuse disposal policy of the state government before Visionscape started work.

The speaker also ordered the Clerk of the House, Mr. Azeez Sanni to invite the Commissioner for the Environment, Babatunde Durosinmi-Etti to appear before the House on the matter next week.

“We are inviting the Commissioner for the Environment to come and report to us within one week. The Clerk should write all the local councils in the state to do the needful and the Commissioner for the Environment should work on this and report to us in a week,” Obasa said.

The Speaker also warned against restricting people from dumping refuse at the dumpsites, as most of the refuse trucks are in a bad state and some abandoned.

Prior to the order, the matter was raised by a lawmaker representing Eti-Osa Constituency 1, Gbolahan Yishawu.