ISLAMABAD: Instead of identifying a permanent landfill site, the city managers have constantly been relying on temporary arrangements.

In a new development, the Capital Development Authority (CDA), which had earlier shown interest in providing land for the landfill site to the Metropolitan Corporation Islamabad (MCI), has backed out of the commitment.

Sources said for the last about a year Director Sanitation Sardar Khan Zimri of MCI had been requesting the CDA to allocate a new site. In July, the then member planning CDA Asad Kayani and member estate Khushal Khan and other officersvisited Sangjani and identified a piece of land there.

However, no development was made on the project as the CDA kept using delaying tactics in finalising the site.

Last month, CDA officers came up with another proposal that a site near Rawat was also under consideration.

`We are not going to earmark any new site for MCI`s sanitation directorate. If their site in I-12 is filled to capacity they should explore a new site on their own.

They should procure land for the new landfill site and after completing formalities we will issue them an NOC,` said CDA spokesman Syed Safdar Ali.

This is the first time when the CDA has officially refused to entertain the MCI`s proposal for setting up a new landfill site.

Before formation of the MCI, the CDA was supposed to collect and dispose of garbage. However, this function was transferred to the MCI after the local government elections.

When contacted, Mayor Sheikh Anser Aziz said it was a commitment of CDA to provide a new landfill site to the MCI as theexisting one in I-12 had reached its level.

`How they can refuse now,` he said, adding he would take up the issue with the CDA and the government for an amicable solution.

The sanitation directorate has been writing to the CDA for the last one year.

One of his letters dated Aug 27, 2018, stated: `Landfill site in I-12 reaches to its capacity and also has several demerits such as it is located on the land of a planned sector.

`It is also adjacent to IJP Road and in the close proximity of residential areas of Rawalpindi. Some portions of the dumping site also affected the areas in its vicinity.

Although all-out efforts are being made to contain outdoor littering by covering the waste with soil, some portions of it af fect areas in the vicinity, read the letter.

It is a matter of grave concerns that Islamabad is still without a permanent landfill site to dispose of about 800 metric tons of garbage the city generates daily.

The issue remained neglected by the city managers as they kept establishing tem-porary sites and shifting them.

The CDA had also earmarked Rs100 million for the landfill project in the financial year 2018-19.

A site for the first landfill was initially selected in Kuri based on an international consultant`s report and following approval from the Pal(istan Environment Protection Agency. But the CDA board in a surprising move in 2012 announced that the location would be shifted to H-10 where a temporary site was established.

A report by the auditor general of Pakistan a couple of years ago stated that delays in the execution of the CDA`s Rs1 billion Kuri landfill project had deprived the capital of the much-needed facility.

Meanwhile, the CDA board a couple of days ago allocated five acres in Lakhwal near Rawal Dam to be used as a temporary garbage station.

`There is confusion about the site. The CDA allocated the land for use as a temporary garbage collection station. This has nothing to do with the land being requested for by the MCI,` the spokesman said.