While addressing delegates at the COP29 summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Tuesday, November 12, CS Environment said that Kenya’s middle class was responsible for polluting the Nairobi River. He made this statement while addressing the conference stakeholders.
As the Secretary of State for the Environment continued to reiterate his remarks, he proceeded to draw parallels between the middle class of the nation and members of the informal sector, whom he praised for their creative approaches to trash management.
The Nairobi River is not being polluted by informal settlers. The middle class is the one responsible for the pollution of the Nairobi River, primarily due to their accumulation of garbage. Those in the informal settlements don’t have garbage because they eat everything,” Duale told the summit stakeholders.
Nevertheless, it did not take long before Kenyans started to respond to his comments, with some internet users describing the controversial statements made by CS Duale as being insulting.
While defending Cabinet Secretary Duale, the spokesperson for the government, Isaac Mwaura, stated that the minister’s comments had been taken out of context and that he had simply praised people who lived in the informal sector for their inventiveness in trash management.
According to Isaac Mwaura, the goal of CS Duale’s speech was to inspire middle-class Kenyans to put in the same amount of effort as the informal sector does to keep the environment clean.
“The statement made by Environment CS Aden Duale has been exaggerated more than it should have been. It was his intention to convey the idea that Kenyans who reside in informal settlements had achieved a high level of expertise in the creative recycling and reuse of waste items, “Mwaura said.
According to Mwaura, the government encourages the middle class as well as all Kenyans to go through the same process of eating everything.
While all this was going on, Cabinet Secretary Duale announced during his address in Azerbaijan that he intends to implement mandatory color-coded trash collection containers for all houses, particularly in Nairobi, once he returns there.
Duale continued by stating that the new action would reduce pollution in the Nairobi River and instead emphasize the importance of recycling waste. “Those who are proven to be responsible for polluting the Nairobi River would be subject to severe punishments,” stated the Cabinet Secretary.
“When I go back to Nairobi, I am going to look at the color-coded rubbish cans, so that when you go to a shop, there will be a can for the organic food,” he said.
“Any individual who is engaging in the dangerous activity near the Nairobi River, regardless of his standing, will be a victim. Forty-two individuals lost their lives in Nairobi as a result of the effects of climate change and floods,” the CS noted.
