Northern Municipality Residents Frustrated by Malfunctioning Garbage Bag Dispensers

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune - www.newsofbahrain.com

Residents in the Northern Municipality are increasingly voicing their frustration over the malfunctioning garbage bag dispensing machines, with half of them out of order. In the most densely populated area of the Kingdom, only one or two employees are responsible for handling the distribution, exacerbating the issue.

Abdullah Al Qubaisi, a member of the North Area Municipal Council, has raised concerns about citizens' dissatisfaction with the distribution of garbage bags. He reported that both he and other council members frequently receive complaints about bag dispensing machines being empty or malfunctioning.

Al Qubaisi criticised the current system involving bag dispensing machines as ineffective. He urged municipalities to take measures to reduce citizens' frustration, such as installing more machines or repairing the existing ones in municipal buildings.

He highlighted that approximately half of the five bag dispensing machines in the Northern Governorate are either broken or out of stock. This situation leaves citizens unable to obtain their allotted bags, causing significant inconvenience. Al Qubaisi described the current system, which requires citizens to visit municipal headquarters and endure long queues, as unfair—especially during scorching hot weather when queues can last from 8 am to 12 pm.

He noted that the five machines, distributed across the cities and villages of the Northern Governorate, are insufficient to meet the needs of the region’s dense population, the highest in the country. Each machine can only hold 100 bag packages, complicating distribution due to the absence of a schedule for refilling or maintaining the machines.

To address these issues, Al Qubaisi proposed that the new cleaning contract with the relevant company should include procedures for garbage bag distribution. He believes the responsible company would manage the distribution more efficiently, thus saving citizens time and effort.

Additionally, Al Qubaisi pointed out that the current distribution process in municipal buildings is managed by only one or two employees, who are overwhelmed with both data entry and bag distribution tasks. He suggested that authorities provide three bag packages per person retroactively to simplify the process and prevent inconvenience over a single bag package.