The president of the United Scrap Dealers Association of Angola (ASUA), Tounkara Mohamed Saidou, acknowledged on Monday (12) the need to suspend the activity due to vandalism and expressed his intention to work with the Government to seek immediate solutions that benefit all those involved.
Speaking to Lusa, Mohamed Saidou said the measure is necessary in light of the increase in cases of vandalism of public property, which have caused the State significant losses. He also announced that he intends to discuss the situation with association members and define strategies to support the Government, while regretting that many scrap dealers, especially young people, have been left without their livelihoods.
At issue is an executive decree which, since last week, has banned the commercial activity of scrap yards and weighing houses for ferrous and non-ferrous materials, aimed at preventing illicit practices and protecting public assets.
Under the decree, all licences for the exercise of this activity have been suspended and revoked. According to the Angolan authorities, these activities have been fuelling the crime of vandalism of public property in the country, mainly affecting the electricity, sanitation, water, transport and other sectors.
According to the president of ASUA, who is originally from Guinea-Conakry, the association intends to bring together all scrap dealers in Luanda with the aim of finding mechanisms to support the Government in combating this phenomenon.
“We cannot be against the measure, because acts of vandalism are constant and this is very bad, as the Government spends a lot of money to meet the needs of the population and people acting in bad faith destroy these assets. We cannot accept that,” he stressed.
Tounkara Mohamed Saidou, who is also leader of the West African Traders Community in Angola, said that the association will begin by raising awareness among operators in this sector, more specifically weighing houses, about the scale of the problem. One proposal is to place inspection agents to verify the origin of the material.
“We first want to register all scrap dealers in Luanda, for example, to know how many we are and where we operate, and in each factory that receives these products to have some members of our association controlling the loads,” he said.
Saidou warned that those involved in vandalism of public property are not the owners of weighing houses, which is why the association also questions who receives this material.
“Because in neighbourhoods we work in backyards, with 20-foot containers; it is children who take ferrous material that is no longer in use. That is what we buy to weigh by the kilo,” he explained, citing as examples vehicle carcasses, cans and similar items, while rejecting the idea that scrap dealers purchase vandalised material.
“They buy [this out-of-use material] and when it reaches between two and four tonnes they take it to processing factories,” he noted.
For several years, the Angolan Government has been grappling with the phenomenon of vandalism of public property, characterised by the theft of ferrous material from railways, electricity substations, manhole covers, metal rubbish bins, water meters, among others.
“They [scrap dealers] do not buy that material, which is why we want to lend our support to the Government,” he added, lamenting that many people have lost their livelihoods, especially young people who may turn to delinquency to meet their needs.
According to the president of ASUA, the business is dominated mainly by West African citizens, some Angolans and Chinese, with Asians owning the processing factories that receive material in large quantities.
The government decree states that the measure applies exclusively to individuals or legal entities that carry out, as a main, ancillary or occasional activity, the provision of services for weighing ferrous and non-ferrous metals, regardless of their origin.
It covers weighing houses, scrap dealers, intermediaries, depots linked to the business of weighing ferrous and non-ferrous metal, operators of scrap scales or weighbridges for commercial purposes, collection points, backyards, warehouses, yards, commercial sites and other spaces not permitted by the applicable commercial legislation, with the exception of legally licensed industrial units, namely steelworks, metallurgical plants and other processing industries.
