BAGUIO CITY — The city government has decided to suspend the collection and disposal of the over 300 tons of garbage generated daily in the 128 barangays due to a conflict over the dumping of the trash at the Irisan dumpsite.

The decision was reached by city officials after thousands of residents barricading the main gate of the 5.2-hectare Irisan dumpsite refused to lift the barricade. The protesting residents have been demanding the city government close the open dumpsite for good.

Lawyer Peter Fianza, city administrator, appealed to residents not to bring out their garbage on the scheduled collection days to prevent the garbage from piling up on the streets.

He asked the residents to wait for the new collection schedule, adding that the mounting piles of garbage on the streets may cause the spread of diseases.

However, barangay officials who are pestered by their constituents about the failure of the city government to collect the garbage lamented City Hall’s decision to suspend the collection of the garbage.

The rotting solid wastes kept in their residence could pose a threat to the health of the household members. It might also pollute the environment because they would be forced to burn the garbage. For more than one week now, thousands of residents of Asin, Tadiangan, and Nangalisan, all in Tuba, Benguet, and in Irisan, Baguio City have barricaded the main gate of the dumpsite, thereby preventing the dozens of haul trucks from using the facility as a transfer station.

Instead of using the facility for the transfer of the collected waste to trucks which bring the garbage to the Capas (Tarlac) sanitary landfill, they claimed that the city government is using the Irisan dumpsite as a dumping area to save on hauling cost.

City officials reiterated their appeal to the protesters to allow the garbage trucks to continue the unloading and loading of garbage at the dumpsite, claiming that these are not dumping waste at the facility.

Earlier, the city government had planned to utilize the unutilized portions of the Irisan dumpsite as a dumping area for residual wastes in the next two months. It also planned to cover the dumped garbage with soil in preparation for its closure which is mandated by Republic Act (RA) 9003 or the Ecological Solid Waste management Act.

The rallyists claimed the continuous dumping of waste at the dumpsite will surely ruin the retaining wall, and this would a garbage avalanche in the areas below the dump.