Ugandan officials said Wednesday the death toll from the landslide Saturday at a massive garbage dump in Kampala, the capital, has risen to 26 people, and 39 people remain missing. The missing include 35 local residents and four garbage collectors, authorities said.
Mayor Eria Lukwago warned that “many, many more” bodies could still be buried under the debris in the city’s Wakiso District at the Kiteezi landfill, the dumpsite for the garbage collected across the city’s metropolitan area.
The landslide that buried people, homes and livestock was triggered by torrential rains that portions of East Africa have experienced in recent weeks.
President Yoweri Museveni has authorized payments to the victims’ families of five million Ugandan shillings ($1,300) for each fatality, and 1 million shillings ($270) for each injured person.
The president has deployed the army’s special forces to the landslide site to help in the recovery efforts. Museveni said he wants to know why people were allowed to live so close to such a "potentially hazardous and dangerous heap.”
Residents of the site said they have complained about the dangers for years, but assert officials have ignored them and have done nothing to alleviate the treacherous living conditions.
The officials “should own up and accept the mistake,” local community activist Abubaker Semuwemba Lwanyaga told Agence France-Presse. "The government should have relocated people from here if they wanted to put a landfill and compensated them, and not waited for a disaster to happen.”
