Uncollected bins in and around Emjindini are becoming a health hazard.

Barberton Times has been informed that only one refuse collection truck is servicing the entire Emjindini with the City of Mbombela Local Municipality (CMLM) southern region (formerly Umjindi Local Municipality) failing to fix the other three vehicles.

The trucks are gathering dust at the council depot situated at Hospital Street.

The southern region authority has not been able to collect garbage properly since last year, following the merging of

Umjindi and Mbombela Local municipalities to form the CMLM.

The one truck currently used to collect garbage is borrowed from CMLM central region (formerly Mbombela Local Municipality).

A general worker in the waste department, who spoke to Barberton Times on condition of anonymity for fear of being victimised, said the southern region has no refuse removal trucks at all.

“There were two Hino trucks that were leased to collect rubish. One broke down and the service provider failed to fix it. This resulted in their lease-agreement contract not being renewed.

”The other three Isuzu trucks, which belong to the municipality, broke down some years ago. They are garnering dust at the depot as we are told there are no funds to fix them,” said the worker.

The employee said, currently, they have to wait for the workers from the central region to finish their daily removal duties before they can borrow a truck.

“We clock in at 06:00 as usual, but only start to work around 13:00 when we get the truck. In between that period there is nothing that we do.

“We are forced to knock off very late but we are not worried about that as we rake in a lot of overtime payments,” added the worker.

Umjindi spokesman, Sam Jele, had not responded to Barberton Times at the time of going to press.