MARGAO: Rajeev Gomes, Nelson Fernandes, Dixon Vaz, Croydon Medeira, Rajashree Nagarshekar, Siddananath Buyao, Ethel Lobo, Rashid Sousa, Melwin Fernandes and countless others have joined hands to fight for Margao’s garbage. The Citizen for Sonsoddo, the Costa Ground Bachao activists, Borda Citizen’s Welfare Forum, members of the Navelim Consumer Civic Forum and various activists from across Margao city are fighting the garbage menace pressurizing locals MLAs like Vijai Sardessai, Digambar Kamat, Reginaldo Lourenco and the 20 councillors led by Arthur D’Silva, the MMC Chairperson. These activists have made it impossible for the administration to turn down their demand to streamline the door to door garbage collection and step up the infrastructure for better garbage management and the heat is being felt by none other than Fomento Green, the Solid Waste Management Plant consignors at Sonsoddo.
“We have gheraoed the MMC Chairperson and got two assurances from him that he will call an extraordinary meeting in seven days to discuss garbage management and will cap the entire Sonsoddo dump with tarpaulin by July 22 to prevent the leak of leachate,” asserted Rajeev Gomes who admits that all this has come from the Battle for Margao Debate wherein Herald- HCN gave the activist a platform to speak and take these issues to the MLAs and the BJP government represented by Nilesh Cabral on June 23.
At this Gherao, we only had Sidadnath Buyao who resides around Sonsoddo while the rest of the members of the Citizens for Sonsoddo or residents of Raia, Curtorim, Maina, Sonsoddo itself or Gogol didn’t turn up. “This is a people’s movement and we need those guys who are the real sufferers of the leachate problem from the vicinity of Sonsoddo to come forward. Lets then hold the government and MMC by its throat for ignoring us citizens,” asserted Dixon Vaz.
The Margao based activists want the residents around Sonsoddo to mobilize in large numbers and protest against the ticking time bomb as they call it. Reacting to this, Rashid Sousa who’s Citizens for Sonsoddo has been active since March to clear up the garbage on the road leading to Sonsoddo and mobilize people and studying the whole capping issue asserted, “We are working hard and devising a strategy to up the ante on this government on many issues at Sonsoddo. We’ve finished strategizing and in a day or two, we will be putting out our action plan to eliminate the 80-meter capping and to ensure the existing dump is treated.”
