Environmentalists have criticized government’s laxity in implementing laws meant to curb the use of plastic bags (Kaveera) in Uganda.
This comes after the Sunday Monitor on the 7th of January 2024, published a story quoting Dr. Barirega Akankwasah, the executive director of the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA), who revealed that the government is back with a revised commitment, now facilitated through the Ministry of Water and Environment (MWE), to make amendments to the National Environment Act and ensure the Kaveera’s erasure from Uganda’s environmental landscape.
The government had recently vowed to impose a total ban on the usage and production of polythene bags, a promise that never passed.
Over the decades, polythene bags have forcefully represented an escalating environmental crisis in Uganda.
Hussein Kato Muyinda, the Executive Director of Earth and Rights Initiative (ERI) says that the polythene waste materials continue to choke the environment without action from government, causing more harm in the country.
“In 2009, the Parliament of Uganda passed an Act banning the importation, local manufacture, sale and use of plastic bags in Uganda. The carrier bags had become a huge threat to the environment. Urban and rural areas experience uncontrolled disposal of polythene waste. It was evident that the polythene waste material was choking the environment,” Muyinda said.
