In a budget hearing before the National Legislature, Monrovia City Mayor John-Charuk Siafa appealed for an additional $4,430,586 in funding to effectively manage the city’s waste and improve overall functionality.
Mayor Siafa said sustainable waste management requires proper fiscal support, which the MCC currently lacks, contributing significantly to the city’s waste management challenges.
The mayor revealed that the MCC’s actual budget requirement for the 2024 fiscal year is $11,023,583, which includes $2.8 million for waste collection, disposal, and management within the city limits. However, the draft national budget for 2024 has only allocated $3,777,965 to the MCC, which is far lower than the corporation’s total budget forecast.
“This indicates that the MCC needs an additional $4,430,586 from the national government, as well as an internal income contribution of $2,813,032, to equal its entire planned budget of $11,021,583,” Mayor Siafa said.
The mayor further lamented that the government’s commitment to the Cleaner Liberia Urban Sanitation (CLUS) project, which is crucial for the city’s waste management, has declined from $1.5 million in the last fiscal year to only $500,000 in the 2024 budget.
He warned that this reduction could lead to the closure of the CLUS project by the World Bank.
“Without achieving the Monrovia City Corporation’s overall actual budget of $11,023,583, the city authority will find it extremely difficult to address Monrovia’s waste management challenges, which does not bode well for the country and its people, given that Monrovia is the country’s capital,” Mayor Siafa said.
The mayor called on lawmakers to allocate the much-needed resources to enable the MCC to effectively manage the city’s affairs, particularly in waste management, which is a pressing issue for the residents of Monrovia.