Locals gathered around the Citizens’ Initiative (GI) “Because it concerns us”, on Friday by placing danger signs and symbolically declaring the Uborak landfill a dangerous zone, continued their fight for the closure and rehabilitation of the municipal waste disposal site located near Mostar.
“The reason for today’s gathering is that the population of this area pointed out danger signs in their yards, wanting to draw attention to the problem of the Uborak landfill, and the second reason is that we declared this area dangerous for human health,” said Edhem Čustović, a member GI “Because it concerns us”.
As he says, the situation at the landfill is critical and if this does not change, a new blockade of the landfill is possible.
“There is a critical situation at the landfill, something is happening behind the walls that you don’t know about, this waste disposal is not in accordance with the prescribed laws and we warn about it all the time. We call on the city authorities to get serious in order to find a solution with the Federal Ministry of the Environment. It is obvious that there is a latent failure to deal with this problem and we have emphasized in the past period that if this way of working continues, we will block the location of the landfill and we will not give up on that,” said Čustović.
The Initiative emphasized that their declaration of the Uborak landfill as a dangerous zone is not only an act of defiance, but a “desperate call” for public attention and a call for action by the city government.
They point out that they feel abandoned in their struggle and insist that the actions of the government must be aligned with the interests of the citizens that the government should serve.
“Today, we have symbolically declared this area a dangerous area, with which we want to once again draw attention to this problem so that this situation is taken seriously. Those of us who are a little deeper into this problem know that the situation has gone beyond all possible limits and that this has become unbearable for the lives of the people living here in the area. Likewise, the danger has spread to other citizens, and they are not aware of it. We have drawn people’s attention to this many times, people who need to solve this problem. Apart from the people who live here, no one knows what the real problem of Uborko is. Everyone thinks Uborak stinks, but that’s the least of the problems. The problem is how it affects people, the environment and how it affects this region,” said Fuad Hujdur, a member of the Initiative.
Another member of the Husnija Greljo Initiative pointed out that people who have houses near Uborak live there because they have no other choice.
”There are no living conditions here, the air, water, everything is polluted here. It’s especially unbearable when it’s windy. The landfill blew up a lot, it probably burst, because it was overloaded. There is no control here, I don’t know what the authorities are thinking. Blocking the landfill is the last solution for us,” concluded Greljo.
