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People watch as an excavator helps search for people trapped in the rubble after a landfill collapsed in Kampala, August 10, 2024. Nineteen people, including five children, have been confirmed dead after a mountain of garbage collapsed at a landfill in the Ugandan capital of Kampala on August 10, according to city authorities. (Photo: BADRU KATUMBA / AFP)
KAMPALA, Uganda – Five children are among 19 people confirmed dead in a landslide at a massive garbage dump in the Ugandan capital of Kampala, a senior official said Sunday, amid claims the site was a disaster waiting to happen.
According to local media reports, on Saturday, August 10, a landfill in Kitezi area north of Kampala collapsed due to heavy rains, burying houses, people and livestock under a mountain of garbage.
President Yoweri Museveni said he had directed the army’s special forces to assist in the search and rescue operation and demanded to find out who allowed people to live near such a “potentially dangerous garbage dump.”
The death toll has now risen to 19, including five children, the region’s resident commissioner Yasin Ndide told AFP after visiting the disaster site.
“The rescue mission is still underway but there is little hope of finding more survivors,” he said, adding that the local government was setting up temporary shelters for the affected people.
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Ndide blamed the casualties on “encroachment” by locals who breached the perimeter fence and settled on the site.
Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesman Patrick Onyango had previously told reporters at the scene that 14 bodies had been recovered on Saturday and four more on Sunday, August 11.
Onyango also told AFP that 14 people had been rescued, an estimated 1,000 people were displaced and police were working with other government agencies and community leaders on how to help those affected.
Kampala Mayor Elias Lukwago said, “Rescue operations are still ongoing and there may be more victims buried in the rubble.”
He described it as a “national disaster” and accused corrupt officials of diverting funds that were supposed to be used to maintain the landfill.
Landfill ‘danger zones’
In a statement on Twitter, Museveni said he had ordered compensation of 5 million Ugandan shillings ($1,300) for each person killed and 1 million shillings ($270) for each injured to be paid to the families of the victims.
He also called for an investigation into why people were allowed to live so close to the nuclear power plant and ordered all residents living in the “danger zone” to evacuate.
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Excavators were still clearing the huge pile of garbage on Sunday as local residents looked on, some wailing in despair.
Lukwago on Saturday expressed concerns about the safety of the 36-acre (14-hectare) landfill, which was established in 1996 and receives almost all the garbage collected in Kampala.
“It’s a disaster, it was bound to happen because the landfill is full,” he told AFP, adding that the landfill receives about 1,500 tonnes of waste a day.
In January this year, Lukwago had warned that people working and living near the nuclear power plant faced multiple health hazards due to the overflow of garbage.
Several areas in Uganda and other parts of East Africa have been hit by heavy rains recently, including Ethiopia, the continent’s second most populous country.
Last month, devastating mudslides in a remote mountainous area in southern Ethiopia killed about 250 people.
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In February 2010, a landslide in the Mount Elgon region of eastern Uganda killed more than 350 people.
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