The Environmental Service Providers Association, made up of 15 sub-contractors involved in the business of garbage collection in Accra, has warned that the entire garbage collection system in the city would collapse by November if the Accra Metropolitan Authority (AMA), does not pay all outstanding debts owed to the association by the assembly since January 2002.

Some members of the association say AMA has not paid for services rendered with their central containers since January this year. The unpaid bills have accumulated to 16 billion cedis. They therefore embarked on a quiet strike action since last Tuesday.

Rubbish piled up in many parts of the city as a result. ADM commented on the rubbish pile up in yesterday's edition.

The Managing Director of Besyd Limited, Mr. Kwabena Kyei, yesterday told Metro Mail that the action taken by the association was inevitable because they had used other means in the past, which yielded no positive results. He said at best, the assembly only pays in trickles, "which is as good as drops of water in an ocean".

He said 70 per cent of the city's dwellers do not pay anything for refuse disposal and that the cost of this failure or inability, under the contract agreement is to be met by the metropolitan authority. However he said, the assembly always defaults in the payment of the bill to the contractors. As a result of this situation, they are not in the position to undertake regular maintenance of the vehicles used in the collection of garbage so when they break down the services are naturally halted.

Mr. Kyei said the Minister for Private Sector Development Mr. Kwamena Bartels, met with the members of the association last Friday to find ways of resolving the impasse. The minister, he said, assured them that all would be done to meet their needs by the end of October. Consequently, he said 50 million cedis each was paid by AMA to all the 15 contractors. He said the money is inadequate because most of them have taken overdrafts of 250 million cedis and above from their bankers to meet the increasing cost of collecting refuse in the city.

AMA abrogated the initial contract signed between the assembly and the City and Country Waste collection Limited, CCWL in 1999, for lack of transparency. The 15 sub contractors working with the CCWL were however contracted to collect the garbage collection in the city as an interim measure.

By the close of work yesterday, Besyd Limited had resumed collection in the Abeka-Tesano area of the city.