DHAKA, 10 February, 2021 (TON): The organization of waste collectors, PWSCP (Primary Waste Collection Service Providers) has threatened to stop taking garbage from the homes in Dhaka if their approval and certification are not restored in a week.

They also demanded to restrict the tender for collection and transportation of waste under the Dhaka city corporations, calling it a conspiracy to block the livelihood of around 19,000 waste collectors in the capital.

Outside the National Press Club on Tuesday, the members of the PWCSP demonstrated. They wore shrouds and sought Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s help to meet their demands.

Annisul Huq, late mayor of Dhaka North City Corporation, was the organizer of the PWCSP. After its formation in 2000, he empowered the organization to certify waste collectors by bringing all the ward-based groups of waste collectors in 2015.

The regular city corporation cleaners usually sweep the main roads of the capital.

The citizens pay 2 percent of their holding tax as a bill for waste management while the PWCSP has been collecting Tk 25-30 as their allowances, Nahid Akter Lucky, president of PWCSP said.

He allegedly said that now the city corporations want to add a Tk 100 bill and award the job of managing the waste collection to the ward councilors,

We, the cleaners who have been doing the work for a long time, are now losing our jobs, he said.

It is likely that this will force the workers to take up illegal work for a living, the officials feared.