Residents of Kwara State have appealed to the state government to return the "roro bins" kept at street corners for refuse collection which were removed from some major areas in the state, to prevent epidemic.

A resident who spoke to journalists said that government's plan to totally remove roro bins for dumping refuse and concentrate them in the interior of Ilorin was against the fundamental rights of the people and that such action was anti people.

The state commissioner for Information, Prince Tunji Moronfoye earlier disclosed that the removal of roro bins from strategic places in the capital city was to ensure speedy evacuation of refuse from interior areas of the state.

Moronfoye said that mobile refuse collection trucks were available in the city hence the need to move the roro bins to interior areas.

The truck according to him would reduce indiscriminate dumping of refuse and also assist the state in generating additional revenues.

Meanwhile, about 49 persons were prosecuted for failing to participate in the monthly sanitation exercise.

Addressing journalists, the state commissioner for Environment and Forestry, Mr. Samuel Olasehinde Bamisaiye expressed disappointment with the attitude exhibited by youths in Zango area towards the environmental sanitation exercise.

The commissioner said one of the defaulters of the sanitation law beat up a police officer and tore his uniform in the officer's bid to arrest him for non-compliance of the sanitation law.

He said the mobile court of the area has come to be and government would do everything possible to ensure that such incidents are not recorded in subsequent exercises.

Also speaking, one of the environmental sanitation officials Mr. Raphael Adedayo Odeyemi said the judge only managed to escape during the fight between the youth and the police officer.

Odeyemi who commended the security personnel's efforts in preventing the situation from escalating, noted that the policeman and the arrested offender had been taken to Zango police station.