BEIRUT/SIDON: Mounting public anger Friday rattled a Cabinet plan to distribute Beirut and Mount Lebanon trash to landfills and dumps around the country, exposing deep, popular distrust with the government. And, experts warned that the perils of inaction were mounting. “We are waiting for the danger to reach our homes,” said Jean Abi Rizk, a water sanitation expert. He warned a heavy downpour in the Jeita-Daraya-Jaltoun-Ballouneh area would halt Beirut’s access to water.

“The usual water pollution is tiny compared to what will flow in with the waste,” he said. “After one or two days, Beirut will be cut off from water, because it is the wise decision of the authorities to throw out that water.”

Most of Lebanon’s geology is highly permeable karstic rock, which is easily contaminated by surface pollution. “Anywhere we have any waste, rain will wash contaminants into the rocks and toward the groundwater,” said Abi Rizk, adding that treatment facilities cannot handle such levels of pollution.

“If you smell something in the water, it’s best not to bathe in it,” he advised. “But even if there is no smell, it could still be very polluted. We’ll need laboratories to test the water and advise citizens properly.” Weather forecasts suggest that Monday could be a rainy day.

Near Sidon, dozens of protesters held a sit-in near the city’s waste sorting and treatment plant to reject a proposal, endorsed by the Cabinet, to divert some of the capital region’s trash there.

Announcing a new movement they called “Against Corruption,” the protesters alleged the plant was mismanaged and polluting the area.

A spokesperson for the demonstrators demanded experts inspect the plant to determine whether it is operating according to international health standards.

“Sidon and its neighboring areas should stand in the face of the political class and reject corruption,” Sana Dabagh, the spokesperson, said.

But Sidon Mayor Mohammad Saudi urged residents to consent to the proposal, which is part of a Cabinet plan to defuse the protracted trash crisis. Agriculture Minister Akram Chehayeb revealed it to the public Wednesday.

“The solution presented by Minister Chehayeb is the logical solution [to the trash crisis], and I praise it,” said Saudi, who Thursday said that he first wanted a new dump for his city before accepting out-of-town rubbish.

Residents of the east Bekaaa village of Majdal Anjar protested in Zahle against the proposal to bury Beirut-area trash in nearby Masnaa. The demonstrators, who included the village mayor and several religious figures, closed the road to the border in one direction for an hour.

Chehayeb promised to renovate the existing dump in Masnaa into a sanitary landfill, to keep poisonous runoff and explosive gases from leaking into the environment.

A handful of demonstrators at the long-retired Burj Hammoud landfill also objected to Cabinet’s plan, which proposes to detoxify the existing mountain of garbage there and then expand the dumpsite toward the sea.

Chehayeb pledged Wednesday that the arrangements to send trash to Sidon, Masnaa and Burj Hammoud, as well as Akkar and Naameh, were temporary. The country needs 18 months to realize the plan’s lasting strategy, he said, which is to return waste-management responsibility to municipalities. At this point, the landfills could be closed.

But demonstrators doubted the Cabinet’s credibility. Saad al-Kurdi, at Burj Hammoud, said, “What starts out as a temporary solution, ends up being a long-term plan, this is why we reject provisional projects.”

Akkar MP Khaled Daher Friday also rejected the Cabinet plan, calling it “hellish and destructive to the Sunni people.” The presidents of the governorate’s eight unions of municipalities also issued a joint declaration rejecting the plan.

Dozens of Akkar residents demonstrated in Abdeh Thursday, vowing to block the proposal to dump trash in Srar. The governorate regularly sends demonstrators to the large rallies in Beirut, under the banner, “Akkar is not a Dump.” “We have so far been peaceful,” shouted one demonstrator Thursday. “Do not test the nonpeaceful among us.”

Chehayeb disputed opposition to the plan, saying it had met the conditions set by environmentalists, including the primary demands, to sort garbage at the source, recycle and compost.

“We said at the very beginning, this plan requires sorting at the source,” he said Thursday.

He added that trash could be sorted at the sites of the dumps-turned-landfills for the first 18 months, until sorting at homes, business and restaurants is adopted more widely.

The “You Stink” campaign said it would hold a news conference Saturday at noon to reveal its position on the Cabinet plan.

Parliament’s Environment Committee is to meet Monday with Chehayeb to review the proposal. – Additional reporting by Pia Francis