Comboni missionary worried over Dandora dumpsite

The Dandora dump site in Nairobi remains an eye sore in the city of Nairobi. Over the years, the dumpsite has been a focus of enviromentalists both local and international. But disturbing circumstances suround initiatives to act on the dump site

from Africa Science News Service

The dump site is located 8km from Nairobi’s Central Business District and adjacent to Korogocho slums, in the city’s eastlands.

 

Korogocho has a population of about 120,000.

 

Over the years, the dumpsite has been a focus of enviromentalists both local and international.

 

The dumpsite stands on a 32 acres, and its sprawling solid waste is now an environmental hazard to about 0.9 million residents of Dandora, Kariobangi and Baba Dogo areas.

 

Indeed experts argue that the Dandora dumpsite which has been in place for over 30 years now, contravenes international environmental laws, which require that dumpsites be closed down after 10 to 15 years of usage.

 

Past studies which involve an analysis of soil samples from locations adjacent to and within the dumpsite show high levels of heavy metals emanating from the site, in particular lead, mercury, cadmium, copper and chromium.

 

A medical analysis of the children and adolescents living and schooling in its neigbourhoods revealed a high risk of diseases associated with high exposure to these metal pollutants.

 

For example, about 50 per cent of children examined who live and school near the dumpsite had respiratory ailments and blood lead levels equal to or exceeding internationally accepted toxic levels (10ug/dl of blood) while 30 per cent had size and staining abnormalities of their red blood cells, confirming high exposure to heavy metal poisoning.

 

Two and half years ago, an Anti-Dandora Interreligious committee was set up to seek ways of clearing the dumpsite.

 The committee was made up of members of the clergy from different Christian denominations with three main areas of concern: To improve the hygenic standards for the residents, the second objective was to improve the security situation in the area, and thirdly to develop an ample enviromnent for the people who live and work in its environs.

 

It was important that the residents are involved in these initiatives to have the goals acheved.

 

So far, very little has been achieved.

 

On May 13, 2004, the Italian corporation, Jacorossi signed a Memmorandum of Understanding with Kenya’s Ministry of Local Government, then headed by the late Karisa Maitha, and the City Council of Nairobi, then headed by Mayor Joe Akech.

 

The plan was to have a new site opened at Ruai, 15 kilometers from the city at a cost of 20 million Euros.

 

20 per cent of the cost was to be met by the City Hall while the remaining 80 per cent would be given by the private sector and development partners.

 

Work on the site was expected to commence in August the same year, 50 days into the MoU.

 

But around June, President Kibaki reshuffled the cabinet. There was a new minister and this was followed by mayoral elections that saw a change of guard at City Hall.

 

The new Mayor and the new Minister rejected the Jacorossi project on unclear grounds.Everything came to a stop.

 

In the fullness of time, the cleaning up of the dumping site and its relocation have been the focus of an “affaire” involving the Italian and Kenyan governments.

 

The initiative was later taken up by an Italian company, “Eurafrica”, to conduct a  feasibility study which was later on suspended.

 

What is disturbing has been the circumstances surounding all initiatives to act on the dump site.

 

While at the Ministry of Local Government, where we were to discuss on the debt conversion (swap) issue, a ministry official told me a propossal had been sent to Italian Ministry of Environment over the relocation of the dumping site. To our surprise, even the officials of the Italian Cooperation did not know about Eurafrica.

 

I happened to see for the first time the documents of its new projects on the dumpsite in March 2007.

 

Italian Minister for Environment, Pegoraro Scanio, who visited Nairobi in November 2006 had shown strong support for our efforts to relocate the dumping site.

 

Among those we had discussed the matter with were the P.S. of Italian Foreign Affairs, Patrizia Sentinelli, who visited Nairobi in January 2007 during the World Social Forum.

 

At this time, the Italian Government signed a protocol for debt conversion (swap) for 10 years of Italian credits (44 milions Euros) with the Kenya’s Minister of Finance, Amos Kimunya.

 

While in Italy I had met two representatives of the Ministry of Environment among others Pier Luigi Petrillo, a lawyer and an official of the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

 

The officials asked me if I knew Eurafrica who had supposedly been paid 721,000 Euro to conduct a study on the Dandora dumspite and city rubbish collection.

 

I did not know about the arrangement.

 

I was surprised to find out from the website of Euroafrica, that the company dealt with a wide range of businessess ranging from arts, water, garbage collection and everything else.

 

I printed out the material and submitted it to a lawyer in Trento, who, after a thorough research told me there was something fishy.

 

The administrator was Bruno Calzia, who transferred the activities sometimes later to a certain Tiziana Perroni.We discovered later on that she was his wife.

 

The two had set up and closed down some 10 companies. They got the money and soon afterwards they closed down everything in one or two years.

 

Eurafrica had a capital of 10,000 Euros and only one employee. The legal office is in Naples, a front office in Rome and headquarters in Nairobi.

 

I discused it with Mr Petrillo and the Italian minister Pecoraro Scanio and I told them I would not have helped them any longer. 

 

Before leaving for Nairobi, I got a telephone call from one Doctor, Corrado Clini, General Director of the Ministry of Environment.

 

He supported Eurafrica telling me that it had worked well in Bosnia. That this name had been given by the Kenyan government. I told him my fears, that I did not want to bring to Korogocho people out to make money at the expense of the poor.

 

After a while Pecoraro Scanio called me telling me that he did not trust at all Clini, an old official at the Ministry.

 

While in Nairobi I went to the Italian Embassy. Nobody knew about Eurafrica. Not even its managers. Not even a telephone number.

 

At the end of July, Clini rung me saying something important would happen around the middle of August, when he would have come to Nairobi to meet his Kenyan colleagues. Neither the Italian Embassy nor the Ministry was aware of this visit. I made the point to communicate it to them.

 

With Clini came three other people - who included Petrillo.

 

He told me that Eurafrica would partner with two other societies: the English Atkins and the Kenyan Howard Humphreys.

 

He added that the World Bank would have even financed the project. I would manage the money, opening a special account and that the aim was the betterment of dumping site people’s life conditions.

 

He even suggested I would sit on the evaluation committee. It was a trap, because I would have been prisoner of the structure. I did not have any title to receive the money. How did they dare to think that only the Comboni missionaries would have accepted the money when in the coordination committee there were other churches and religious communities?

 

Moreover the real problem was the society itself: it was so fishy! Clini answered, angrily, that there was no problem at all: after all it was chosen by the Kenyan government and the Italian money would have been given only at the completion of the project, but not before hand.

 

Nonetheless my suspicious become all the stronger the following day when there was a meeting at the Ministry of Local Government, between the Italian and Kenyan delegations.    

 

Among the Eurafrica representatives there was Renzo Bernardi, well known in Nairobi due to his association with firms like Oto Melara and Beretta and others.

 

I sent a message to the Italian minister Pecoraro Scanio informing him that in my opinion the real minister was Clini, not him. At time of writing (end of November), the Ministry has suspended the feasibility study entrusted to Eurafrica, giving it to a technical agency of the Ministry itself, to evaluate the project.

 

An internal investigation has been launched. It is still too little, to stop lobbies that want to speculate on ecological business!

I believe that what I and others are experiencing is a fighting within the Ministry of the Environment itself.

 I hope that it will not slow down the process of relocating the dumping site. For us it is a death-life issue. To speculate on poor’ lives is quite mean. I feel very bad that to a local Mafia we would add the Italian one. I would have never thought that right here where we are very careful about what is going on around us, it started all this “business….”.