Investigative journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni is urging a shift in how waste management services are handled as the government prepares to re-award sanitation contracts following the termination of its long-standing deal with Zoomlion Ghana Limited.

According to him, the contract should be one that eliminates third-party contractors and puts Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in direct control.

Speaking on JoyFM’s Top Story on Thursday, June 12, Mr Awuni commended President John Mahama’s decision to discontinue the nearly two-decade Youth Employment Agency (YEA)–Zoomlion sweeping contract.

However, he stressed that any new arrangement must correct the structural loopholes that enabled years of inefficiency and lack of accountability.

• Read also: Zoomlion contract will not be renewed, Sweepers’ fees to increase—President Mahama

“This contract has been running since 2006, and it's only for sweeping, something every assembly in this country has the capacity to supervise,” he said. “We don’t need a third party here.”

According to him, while Zoomlion managed this component, its sister company, Better Ghana Management Services, handled other YEA sanitation models, involving as many as 70,000 workers, under equally questionable terms.

Mr Awuni argued that the YEA has already proven it can partner directly with public institutions such as the Fire Service to run employment models without intermediaries. This, he believes, should be replicated for the sweeping model.

“Every assembly can run this contract in collaboration with the YEA. What they should consider awarding to external companies are only the aspects that involve lifting refuse to final disposal sites,” he said, noting that most assemblies lack waste trucks and would benefit from competitive contracts in that specific area.

He described a worrying disconnect between Zoomlion, the YEA, and local authorities, where assemblies often have no copies of the contracts, yet see funds deducted automatically to pay the contractor, regardless of whether services are delivered.

“And there is evidence that the Accra Metropolitan Assembly wrote in 2022 to the YEA to say that the sweepers and the Zoomlion, we don't see them, and YEA also said we don't know them.

“So the assembly is forced to take its own IGF, to employ people to sweep and then pay again to Zoomlion for these people who are supposed to have done the sweeping,” he stated.

Mr Awuni maintained that empowering local authorities to supervise and execute basic sanitation duties will enhance transparency and allow citizens to hold assemblies directly accountable for the cleanliness of their communities.

"Now it is expected that every assembly should be able to award its contract, or those that they can do, they should, so that when we want to hold them responsible, there wouldn't be excuses that a contract is awarded to A, B, C, we don't know about it, we only pay, so this is the expectation going forward.