a Jesuit leans on the garbage to denounce the lack of collection

A priest has denounced the deterioration of the surroundings of the historic San Ignacio school, residence of teachers and seminarians. The Indonesian Environment Minister demanded immediate action and threatened legal action against the local administration, which admitted the difficulties.

Yogyakarta () – A Jesuit priest, Father Mutiara Andalas, has attracted the attention of the Indonesian authorities by lying on a mountain of garbage to denounce the poor management of waste disposal in the city of Yogyakarta. The symbolic gesture, which took place at the beginning of October but did not go viral until recently on social media, provoked an immediate reaction from local authorities and the Minister of the Environment, Hanif Faisol Nurofiq.

The garbage is piled up in a temporary area near the historic San Ignacio School, residence of Jesuit professors and seminarians. “This mountain of garbage is located next to our fence and the campus of Sanata Dharma University,” Father Andalas explained to .

The priest was accompanied in the action by a student named Vian, originally from the island of Flores, in the eastern province of Nusa Tenggara. “At first we wanted to collect the waste and take it to the Yogyakarta Regional House of Parliament, but we decided to opt for a different gesture to attract more attention.”

The spread of the video on social networks led the Minister of the Environment to visit the place. During the visit, Minister Nurofiq raised the idea of ​​taking legal action if the issue was not resolved quickly. “If waste management had been done correctly, such an unfortunate situation would not have occurred at the Mandala Krida site,” the minister declared, accusing the local administration of neglecting the state of the deposit despite the fact that the government has allocated several billion rupees to waste disposal.

About 300 tons of waste are generated every day in Yogyakarta, but only 180 tons are collected and disposed of, admitted Mayor Sugeng Purwanto. The rest remain piled up, compounding the risk of sanitation issues for the surrounding community, including Colegio San Ignacio and the Sanata Dharma University campus.

The governor and sultan of Yogyakarta, Hamengkubuwono However, lack of coordination with civic bodies and absence of an effective plan for a fixed landfill continue to hamper the resolution of the problem.