Clean sweep needed: Eastleigh’s First Avenue suffocates under garbage avalanche

The familiar stench returned like an unwelcome guest, acrid and pervasive, choking the air on First Avenue. The garbage menace, banished months ago like a bad dream, had slunk back, rearing its ugly head in a mountain of plastic bags, rotting food, and discarded furniture. The once-clean avenue, where shoppers weaved between a forest of hawkers and their wares, now resembled a landfill, the ground obscured by a tide of refuse.

"We were breathing again, then bam!" exclaimed Asha Hassan, whose colorful fabrics now huddled fearfully in the diminished space left by the garbage sprawl. "Who throws their filth on clean ground? Don't they see we make a living here?" Her frustration echoed through the air, thick with the smell of decay.

A heep of garbage on First Avenue (Photo: Abdirahman Khalif)

Across the avenue, a buyer arrived from Kawangware, nose crinkled against the assault on her senses. "I came all this way for carpets, not a compost heap!" he grumbled, shaking his head. "City Hall, whoever's in charge, clean this mess up! We deserve better than to wade through stench to buy goods."

The carpet shop owner, Abdikadir Amir, watched his potential customers turn away, their faces contorted in disgust. "Garbageland," he muttered, despair seeping into his voice. "The flies are back, the customers are gone, and my partner spends half the day mopping the floor because clients track in the filth from there." His wife, Haniya, chimed in, her voice sharp with anger, "This can't keep happening! They promised change, but it's the same old story. We need a real solution, not empty speeches!"

First Avenue's garbage saga was a well-worn record, scratched and repetitive. Promises faded faster than the stench of rotting waste. The cycle of cleaning, temporary reprieve, and then, inevitably, the return of the garbage monster, had become a grim ballet of neglect and frustration.