Not Policy. Not Funding. A Deployed Framework: The Overlooked Factor Behind Kano’s Quiet Waste Collection Turnaround

By Funmi Ogundare

THISDAY investigation traces the operational model that transformed settlement-level waste collection in parts of Kano to an unlikely source — a Ghanaian practitioner working out of Lusaka, Zambia, whose framework was quietly adopted after two cholera emergencies proved it worked.

When waste collection coverage in three of Kano’s most congested settlement wards improved noticeably in the second half of 2024, the state government credited new policy directives and increased funding for the Kano State Refuse Management and Sanitation Board (REMASAB). Community leaders pointed to political will. The contractors said it was better equipment.

A THISDAY investigation has found that the decisive factor was none of these. The improvement traced back to something far less visible: a structured operational framework originally developed more than 4,000 kilometres away, in the informal settlements of Lusaka, Zambia, by a Ghanaian waste management practitioner named Denteh Kwame Brako.

The framework — a tiered logistics model for collecting waste in environments where no road is wide enough for a conventional truck — was brought to Kano by a subsidiary of the Jospong Group of Companies, the Ghanaian multinational that operates waste management services in more than 20 African countries. But the operational blueprint did not originate at Jospong’s headquarters in Accra. It was developed in the field by Brako, who arrived in Lusaka in 2013 and spent two years mapping settlement conditions before codifying what is now known as the Structured Municipal Sanitation Deployment and Waste-Control Coordination Framework.

What the framework actually does. The concept is deceptively simple, but its execution is not. Settlements are divided into micro-collection zones. Each zone gets a named supervisor and a crew of six to eight collectors operating daily door-to-door routes using manual carts and motorised tricycles — equipment that fits lanes below three metres wide. Collected waste moves to perimeter staging containers at the settlement edge, where skip trucks take over. The critical innovation is that drainage clearance is integrated into the daily collection cycle rather than treated as a separate municipal function.

That last point proved decisive during two cholera outbreaks in Lusaka. In 2017–2018 and again in 2023–2024, Zambia’s District Health Management Team coordinated its waste-related emergency response directly through Brako’s operation. The pre-existing framework allowed the operation to scale to emergency intensity within 48 hours. Over 100 field workers were deployed daily across six settlement zones, with drainage corridors being cleared on every route. The Engineering Institution of Zambia, the statutory body that regulates all engineering practice in the country, subsequently conferred an Industry Practice Contribution Award on Brako in recognition of the framework’s significance.

“Everyone looks for the policy document or the budget line. Nobody asks whether the operator on the ground has a system that actually works in a three-metre lane. That is where waste collection succeeds or fails in African cities,” said Denteh Kwame Brako, speaking to THISDAY from Lusaka

How it reached Kano. THISDAY has confirmed that when the Jospong Group’s Nigerian subsidiary began operations in Kano in early 2024, the deployment followed Brako’s framework rather than the conventional approach of assigning compaction trucks to main-road routes. Zone supervisors were appointed. Tricycle crews were structured in the pattern Brako had developed. Staging containers were placed at settlement perimeters. The drainage-clearance integration — the

 feature that had proved critical during Lusaka’s cholera response — was included from the start.

Two REMASAB officials, speaking to THISDAY on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the Jospong subsidiary’s operational model in the settlement wards was materially different from what other contractors were doing. “The difference was not the money or the trucks. It was the structure of the operation — the zones, the supervisors, the daily routing. It was clearly a system, not improvisation,” one official said.

Neither official was aware that the system had originated in Zambia or that it had been developed by a single practitioner.

The gap the framework fills. Nigeria is not short of waste management policies. The National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA) publishes guidelines. State waste management authorities have mandates and budgets. What has been consistently absent is what Brako calls “the operational layer” — the codified, field-ready system architecture that translates policy into daily collection in an environment where the physical infrastructure does not support conventional methods.

Lagos, which generates an estimated 13,000 tonnes of solid waste daily, faces identical constraints in settlements such as Makoko, Ajegunle, and Mushin. The Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) has acknowledged that reaching informal settlement interiors with its existing fleet remains a challenge. Whether the Kano deployment prompts a broader adoption of structured micro-collection models in Nigerian cities may depend less on funding or regulation and more on whether municipal authorities recognise that the gap is operational, not financial.

For Brako, the answer is straightforward. “Any African city that is serious about settlement-level collection can implement this within twelve months,” he told THISDAY. “What you need is defined franchise terms, structured compliance reporting, and a municipal authority willing to hold the operator accountable. The framework does the rest.”

In Lusaka, the framework has been in continuous use since 2016, survived two national health emergencies, and earned formal recognition from the country’s statutory engineering body. In Kano, its early results are visible in three settlement wards that, six months ago, had no structured collection at all.

The policy was already there. The funding was already there. What was missing was a deployed framework — and the practitioner who built it was working out of a different country entirely.