Fines up to BD1,000 for ‘Clean Law violators’

The executive bylaws of the Cleanliness Law, which imposes fines of up to BD1,000 for cleanliness violations, have been issued. The Minister of Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning has issued bylaws for the new stern cleanliness law which imposes hefty fines for violations. The latest development brings the law very close to its implementation.

With the new law, some violations will receive a fine between BD50 and BD300 while other more serious violations will receive fines between BD500 and BD1,000. Littering, urinating or spitting are some of the violations that will be heavily penalised under the new law with such violations to receive fines of up to BD300. 

The law imposes higher fines of up to BD1,000 for transporting garbage or dangerous substances without a licence. The law was passed in the parliament and Shura earlier this year. The law comes after Bahrain experienced ‘garbage crisis’ in recent years. The authorities have also been urged to allot additional funds to cleaning up garbage to avert a crisis. MP Ahmed Al Ansari said that the current allocation of funds towards cleaning up the country is not enough.

He said that further allocation of funds is necessary to carry out comprehensive cleaning activities throughout the year. He urged the Ministry of Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning to work with the Ministry of Finance to sort out the budget. He said that the recently distributed government housing units add complexity to the clean up efforts and therefore would need a higher cleaning budget, something he says, was not considered when the budget for cleaning was set a few years ago.