Constituency #2 Candidate to the rescue after area garbage truck fails
By Ryan Haas
Reporter-SKNVibes.com
 |
| Marcella Liburd, Labour Party candidate for Constituency #2 |
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts-THE SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT CORPORATION (SWMC) of St. Kitts suffered yet another setback on August 4 when the lone repaired garbage truck for the Basseterre area broke down again. Thankfully, Marcella Liburd, former Speaker of the House and current Labour Party candidate for Constituency #2 stepped in to assist those affected by the garbage pile-up in the McKnight area.
“I really cannot give enough thanks to Marcella Liburd and the six men who helped clean up the McKnight area when our truck broke down,” Wilmon McCall, Operations Manager for the SWMC told SKNVibes. “It was really marvelous, and should be commended.”
McCall stated that the waste had been accumulating for a one week period in McKnight when Liburd called him and asked what she could do to help.
“I asked her if she could get some men together to help, and by 8 p.m. that night we had six eager men from the area and one of my workers hard at work on the clean up,” McCall said. Liburd allegedly paid the men’s wages based upon recommendations from McCall.
It was not until 1:30 on Sunday morning that the men completed their work in McKnight, but McCall said that the late hour did little to dampen their enthusiasm.
“Once they finished McKnight they asked me if they could move on to the Village and keep working, but I told them that was enough for one night.”
The Operations Manager added that the SWMC was so pleased with the men’s efforts that there will likely be an offer to employ them time on an 8 p.m.-midnight shift permanently. ~~Adz:Right~~
When asked what the state of clean-up efforts around the island were since the massive breakdown of SWMC trucks began over a month ago, McCall gave a mixed report.
“The clean-up is going alright. We hope to have things in the Basseterre area back to normal by the end of this week. One of our main issues right now is making people in the Basseterre area aware that we are only doing a once a week pick-up now, instead of the three times a week we had been doing before.
“Some areas, such as Bird Rock, have done very well at managing their waste in a way that prevents disease and stray animals, but we must continue informing those in downtown Basseterre [to the new waste management strategy],” McCall said.
He further reported that The Admiral’s Enterprises Ltd. will continue to handle waste management in rural areas of the island.
SKNVibes’s investigations into the rural pick-up schedule have revealed that some areas, such as West Farm and St. Pauls, have had very little service interruption but residents of other areas such as St. Peters and parts of Challengers have complained about several weeks passing in between their garbage collection.
