Lives, uncounted lives are lost in garbage slides
Imagine garbage moving down from mountain heaps
Avalanches upon avalanches sliding down
Rickety malnourished youths poking around-
To make ends meet in the garbage
Suddenly they are swept away,
Buried in the sludge in garbage race
Swept away and buried without a groan…
In town in the city in the land
Life is going on as usual
As if nothing happened…
Where’s our country’s conscience?
Who’s mourning for these souls?
Then I remember…
Aren’t we choking on, heaving under garbage?
Everywhere there is reeking noxious smell
Yeah, hold your breath, if you can
Foul is the air we breathe
In the city, in the towns and on the road
Acrid smells and escaping garbage odor reek everywhere
Wait a minute, just a moment:
What else is left functioning-
If I may ask you?
Parliament is dodging its August house-
It is seek fresh in regional seats!
Law and order systems are choking
Courts are breathless and strangled
Justice is arrested by delays and adjournments
Police no longer know how to bark or arrest
Rivers lakes and channels are heavily silted
Garbage heaps and mountains are overflowing in slides
Roads are clogged and bruised with potholes
Worship houses are dens of robbers and conmen
Morals have been turned upside down
Leaders openly practice fraud and larceny
Doctors are draining hospitals as they refill their clinics
Adulterated prescriptions and supplies pass for genuine goods
The stench of graft is reeking in reeling winds
Everywhere garbage is entering public places
As managers whet their teeth in sharp practice
Corruption and fraud are elevated and toasted for
Impunity is roaming everywhere in gallivanting strides
Gamba nogu and know who with ease open doors
The children of understanding and tutoring are ignored,
Meanwhile rogues dictate terms and conditions for survival
And the common man is still asking:
“How can we manage or remove the garbage!”
You man of faith,
You still have hope?
Haven’t you heard of the Kitezi overflow
Or it was the garbageslide!
Alas,
It’s not only in Kitezi!
It’s in Kyanamira
It is in every town
It is in every village
Unless your nose is totally blocked!
The above poem was written by Davis Ndyomugabe of Qacheqis
