Binaliw

We will not have a final body count until all those reported missing have been found.

- ALEX MAGNO

The work at the Binaliw landfill is slow, tedious and dirty. For years, trash has been dumped on the garbage pile until the mountain of refuse collapsed. Dump workers and those at the nearby materials recovery facility (MRF) were buried.

The tragedy at Binaliw landfill calls up a similar collapse a few years ago at the Payatas dumpsite. More than assigning blame, we need a thorough policy review of such sites. The trash our cities generate quickly overwhelms the dumpsites we have designated to contain it.

Binaliw is a fairly young dumpsite. The DENR issued an environmental compliance certificate to the previous operator, ARN Central Waste Management Inc. (ACI), only in November 2017. The next year, the Cebu City government gave a special land use permit to ARN Builders, ACI's mother firm. The land use permit covered 10 hectares accommodating two landfills with lifespans of five and 16 years.

The Cebu City Council has withheld approval for the dumpsite even as the area received trash from the city. From the start, Cebu residents opposed the project, citing, among other things, safety. Residents in the vicinity of the dumpsite complained about the stench, the swarm of flies and all other possible health hazards brought about by the operation of this facility.

Between May and June 2019, the regional office of the DENR's Environmental Management Bureau issued notices of violations against ACI for improper garbage handling and for missing deadlines for monitoring reports. This was obviously not one of the best-run landfill operations in the country.