Lately, however, the people who are doing this have no respect for the residential areas.
They remove the contents of the bin (leaving it next to the bin) in order to get deeper into the bins to retrieve the plastic.
Once they are finished, they simply move on to the next bin.
The mess they make is left for the home owners to attend to (as per recent articles in the Brakpan Herald: any contents/bags left outside the 240L wheelie bins will not be removed by the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality Waste Department).
I have also witnessed a person stealing a 240L wheelie bin. The bins are easier to transport the plastic.
My question to the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality is: what action/plan is in place to stop these people from creating a mess and frustrating the town residents?
Clearly this problem is going to escalate, if action is not taken immediately?
Editor’s note: Comment was requested from the Ekurhuleni Metropolitan Municipality and the following response was received from spokesperson Themba Gadebe:
“EMM Waste Management Services is aware of these matters, however, we are not in the position to control these activities,” he said.
“Residents are urged to separate their waste as follows: kindly place recyclables in a separate bag and place it out as requested by the service provider MPACT.
“MPACT is issuing green bags to residents for the collection of recyclables on a weekly basis, so for the ease of recycling activities if the residents comply with source separation of waste, it will eliminate the mess caused by the informal recyclers that move from bin to bin.”
