Papua New Guinea: The Power of Many

Case Study: Linked Works

Click on the following links for further information about this case study:

Return to Contents

Writing by Grade 6 students
Mongniol Community School
Wewak, PNG

Mongniol Rubbish Dump

Grum! Grum! Grum!
Goes the old rubbish dump truck.
With it's rumbling noise.
Like rumbling thunder.

Early morning at six am till six pm
Men come and go empty the rubbish
From the town residents.

Who cares? is what they think.

Umsh! Umsh!
Goes the smell of the dump
Into my classroom
I sniff sniff and sniff trying to breathe

But who cares? is what they think.

Oh no! It's just too much for me
The smell becomes stuffy and smelly
Makes my stomach grumble
And affects my learning.

How can someone help and stop them
For me, a child of today's generation
And tomorrow.

By Nasomai

Environment Pollution
Mongniol Rubbish Dump

Almost six years of schooling, sitting inside my classroom, cracking my head, I can smell and feel the cool breeze coming through from all angles. But still the same environment surrounds me. Nothing else but the same old rubbish dump.

Doing my school work is not a problem to me, but the dump affects my health and my studies. But how can I complain about the old rubbish dump?

Nothing else, but I have to stay and continue my primary education for this year only to complete my grade six.

I wish we should already have an advanced country, that we shouldn't have this problem. The place of the old Mongniol rubbish dump should be good shopping centres with big buildings and beautiful flowers planted around the buildings. There should be car parks, platforms, fish ponds and show grounds.

So I wish, one fine day, when I grow up, that we would all be in a luxury world in my own clean country. So it is a problem for us to face such as the Mongniol rubbish dump that causes the pollution of the surrounding environment.

It hurts my lungs and heart and makes me sick often.

I would like to ask the head master to ask the manager of the works department to send some machines to remove the rubbish.

The Pollution of the Mongniol Rubbish Dump

My name is Sandy Kewa. I am one of the 900 students of Mongniol School in Wewak town. I would like to bring my concerns to the Wewak Town Authority about the rubbish dump near our school.

The dump is only about 30 metres away from our school and it really affects all the students and teachers in the school. The smell is unbelievable. It makes us feel like vomiting and it also brings many flies.

When we eat our food during lunch time we can't stand the flies. No wonder so many students get sick with diarrhoea and stomach-ache because of the flies.

I appeal to the town authority to move the rubbish dump away from our school and away from the town area.

The dump also gives a bad impression to any visitors or tourist who come visit our town. If the town council is serious about cleaning the town area they must remove the dump from where it is now.

On behalf of the students and teachers of Mongniol school I strongly urge the town council to do something about the rubbish dump - now!

It must be done before any students get any serious sickness because of the poor council foresight and before visitors or tourists give a bad report of my home town.

Thank you for listening.