Kilifi,KENYA:Food vendors in the major towns of Kilifi County are crying foul over losses following poor garbage collection by the county department of environment.
They say customers have been snubbing their food cafes and butcheries claiming poor hygiene around their areas of work.
Speaking to Baraka FM on Wednesday, Maimuna Farouk a fish Vendor in Kilifi town said since the start of the rainy season she has been receiving complaints from her customers on the hygiene concerns.
She said the situation normally gets worse during the rainy seasons where a lot of dirty and contaminated water stagnate near her working place due to poor drainage system.
“You see we (food) vendors get it tough especially during seasons like this rainy season,” Maina said.
“Look, near my place of work, normaly dirty water stagnate during such like seasons. This makes customers run away from my butchery due to health concerns,” she added.
Another food vendor whose café is adjacent to the Kilifi Kumbu market who never wanted to me mentioned accused the departments of Health services and Environment for what he terms as poor management of the directorate.
He said due to the ongoing rainy season, people are at risk of being affected by water and dirty related diseases such as cholera and bilharzia.
“For sure the county government’s two departments have totally failed,” he said.
“These departments must work hand in hand to ensure the environment is clean and safe, but it’s not happening that way. Look here, a lot of dirty water has stagnated here, just in front of my café and customers run away. But no one cares,” he said.
However, Kiringi Mwachitu the CEC in charge of Environment and Garbage collection earlier on promised to deal with the situation amicably, but still a big challenge is standing before him.
“I understand that there has been a delay in garbage collection in some major town of this county but we are working on it. I call upon the community to also be responsible for the cleanliness of the environment,” Mwachitu was quoted saying when Baraka FM visited his office earlier this month.
