BEIRUT: Progressive Socialist Party leader MP Walid Jumblatt vowed to seal off the road outside the controversial Naameh dump on Jan. 17, the date set by the government to close the landfill in the Chouf town where Sukleen trucks empty their haul.
“The road outside the Naameh dump will be closed on Jan. 17,” Jumblatt told local daily Al-Akhbar in remarks published Friday.
Jumblatt said the aim behind the closure “is to arrive at a decision based on the proposed plan.”
“I gave instructions to party [PSP] ministers that the bold waste plan must be based on a decentralized solution,” Jumblatt said in remarks published Friday by local newspaper Al-Akhbar.
The Cabinet failed Thursday to reach an agreement on a plan to treat solid waste. If unresolved, it threatens to flood Beirut’s streets with trash after Jan. 17, the date when the contract between the government and Sukleen, the company responsible for sweeping and cleaning the streets of Beirut and Mount Lebanon, expires.
Jumblatt, however, admitted that the road closure cannot last forever.
“We cannot close the road indefinitely because by doing so we would be burying ourselves in trash,” he said.
Jumblatt said he turned down two offers to establish a waste treatment facility and to convert waste into fuel in favor of the cement company under Siblin.
“After we studied both proposals, it turned out that they are expensive and polluting,” he said, while praising the government for renouncing the establishment of incinerators.
“In the end, we will need a site in the Chouf to create a landfill,” Jumblatt said, adding that he would discuss this matter with the municipalities.
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