WHAT MAKES A CLEAN CITY?

Kenya turns 50 next year; this is a milestone that many countries achieve in turmoil, disorder, squalor and filth.

Some countries find themselves without proper governments or public order as they attain such milestones. We are fortunate that as we turn 50 next year, we are a nation fairly intact in many ways, albeit with a myriad of challenges.

As we take stock of this turn, some basic and fundamental questions are good to ask. What strides have we made in the various targets we set as a nation? Are there certain targets that we can put in the bank as already attained? If not, as we turn 50 years, are there some we could round up and close as attained?

I want to invite the discussion narrowing down to clean cities and towns. Many talk about clean cities as just the cleanliness of the physical environment. In this campaign, together with our key partners, we wish to look at clean cities and towns not only from that narrow prism but from the wider sense of international practices.

When we say London is clean, that Tokyo is a clean city, that Milan is spotless, it is not just the physical elements that these towns have achieved. It is also the various components of services that come with such an environment.

These cities have gone beyond the physical cleanliness to encompass the concept of service delivery as core to cleaner environments. Accessible, timely and quality service forms part of the notion of a clean city or town and this is the tranformative agenda we are driving.

Recently, the MasterCard Destination Cities Index ranked Nairobi 4^th most popular destination in Africa. This is great for us as a country. However, do we have the prerequisite service delivery component to complement this ranking? If visitors came to Nairobi convinced by this ranking and tried to access some of our services, how happy would they be to return to Nairobi? It is thus very easy for such gains to be lost if the current garbage situation in our towns and cities is not reversed.

If they took a drive around the city and its neighborhood, are they likely to come across unsightly mounds of garbage and filth? Is it possible that they may loose a camera and wallet as they try to savor our heritage and scenery? Would we call the sights along some streets ‘picturesque and quite scenic?”

These are some of the indexes The Clean Kenya Campaign-TCKC and our key partners are grappling with.

Together with our key partners, The Public Service Transformation Department at the Office of The Prime Minister and The National Environment Management Authority-NEMA, we will host The 2nd Consultative Forum on Waste Management of at The KICC on the 28th August 2012 to discuss practical steps towards separation of waste at source as sustainable solution towards waste management.

We are happy to announce that we are documenting local initiatives in waste management whose capacities can be enhanced and up scaled. We are happy to announce that some of our key partners have already begun working on practical steps towards achieving separation of waste at source. The Ministry of Public Health and Sanitation has already pledged the placement of waste receptacles in estates and markets to enable waste recyclers collect specific waste in better form than what is currently happening in the Dandora dump site and other waste dumps.

In this regard, we will be hosting a cleanup and awareness campaign in partnership with the Municipal Council of Mombasa on the 18th August 2012. Similarly, the Municipal Council of Eldoret is today hosting the Eldoret Local Urban Forum at the town hall in Eldoret where our Chairman Mr. Elijah Agevi will be participating.At the same time, TCKC will be having a consultative meeting with His Worship The Mayor of Kisumu and the Town Clerk on Monday the 6th August 2012.

These are practical steps that we are taking with our key partners towards delivering a Clean Kenya by 1st June 2013 as a delivarable by the people of Kenya.

We trust that through this initiative, we are already delivering some pillars of Vision 2030 especially the Economic Pillar. We hope to deliver cleaner cities when Kenya turns 50 next year in June.Further to this delivery, we also hope that we shall begin reaping the gains of Vision 2030 when separation of waste at source becomes an economic activity employing our youth, creating wealth for the country and widening the tax bracket.

Under the Public Private Partnership-PPP and public participation as government policy, TCKC wishes to tremendously thank Mr. Emmanuel Lubembe, Head of Public Service Transformation Department and Mr. Titus Simiyu, Provincial Director of Environment- NEMA, Nairobi for their tireless efforts in assisting us shape strategy, encouraging and enriching our ideas and supporting our logistics through reaching out to partners.

We can only give back by undertaking to deliver what we have set out to achieve with this kind of support.

Best,

 

Otieno Sungu,

Programs Manager,

The Clean Kenya Campaign-TCKC

0729294743

Blogspot; http://kcdnkomarockswatch.blogspot.com

                                   

Website; http://www.kcdnkenya.org