Daily Times

LAHORE: The turnout ratio of Lahore Waste Management Company waste removal complaints has been 86 per cent higher than last year, sources inside MCL and LWMC told Daily Times on Saturday.

The story behind this surge is complicated as a major reason for the increase in complaints was said to be non-compliance of elected chairmen and vice chairmen of UCs of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Daily Times has learnt.

As many as 13,740 complaints have been received by the complaint cell of Lahore Waste Management Company. In comparison to the ongoing year, 7,353 complaints were received in the 2017.

Sources inside of MCL and LWMC told that the graph of waste related complaints raised due to lack of support from some chairmen, deputy chairmen, and lord mayor belonging to the Nawaz league.

They further said that the some elected chairmen and vice chairmen ‘purposefully’ failed to coordinate with officials of LWMC in connection to remove the animal’s offal and filth during Eid. The purpose of the uncooperative behaviour was to show bad performance of LWMC, District Administration and newly-elected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government, it was claimed.

Sources also claimed that there was an ongoing conflict between the Lord Mayor Col (r) Mubashir Javed and the LWMC management, and to that end, the former had criticised LWMC over it’s ‘poor’ performance and failure to keep the city clean.

Farukh Butt later arranged a press conference and dismissed Col (r) Javed’s statements. In the press conference, both officials stated that the negative comments of Lord Mayor directly demoralised the workers working in the field and left a very bad impression.

Cleanliness operation was affected by rain at Shalimar town but normal proceedings were resumed once the rain subsided. “Mayor Lahore is respected on all platforms but such demoralising comments are uncalled for when 15,000 workers are performing their duties with utmost honesty to ensure best cleanliness services.”

It is pertinent to mention here that a group of councilors met with Deputy Commissioner Lahore and LWMC Chairman Anwar-ul-Haq on Saturday and informed him about their concerns regarding the cleanliness.

A spokesperson of LWMC claimed that the UC-142 chairman was threatening the workers to keep away from their duties.

In a query, he informed that LWMC has suspended three workers (working in New UC 142) on account of misconduct and ghost. He said that LWMC staff was working at the UC chairman’s house. He further said that LWMC took the stance of zero tolerance over corruption or any misappropriation.

On the other hand, LWMC on Saturday arranged a press conference to reveal the statistics of clean-up operations during Eid ul Azha. On the occasion, officials said that they have broken the disposed record of seven years to remove 45,540 tons of animal waste, particularly offals, during three days of Eid-ul-Azha.

Chairman LWMC admitted that the counter checking mechanism was poor but the company was trying to improve it.

He has also announced to give 17 days salary as bonus to all LWMC employees as a token of appreciation.

Commissioner Lahore Division also appreciated MD LWMC and his team for exceptional performance in the city. He said that 17 day salary could not be a compensation for these dedicated workers who have sacrificed their Eid holidays and helped ensure a clean environment.