| …residents displeased with water qualityGuyana Water Inc commissioned a new $104M well station yesterday, at Canefield, East Canje Berbice. The new well will serve some 14,000 residents of East and West Canefield, as well as New Area Housing Scheme, Canefield, and surrounding areas. Previously, the Cumberland well station supplied water to Canefield on a shift-system basis. This resulted in reduced pumping hours and low water pressure for both villages.After the well station was commissioned, angry residents of Canefield voiced their concerns about the poor quality of water that they have been receiving from the new well. Holding a bottle of murky, yellow water, a resident of Canefield said, “This is unacceptable! We cannot accept this!“This [is] what we have to pay for and still buy water for our children to drink— unacceptable!” The resident said that all the Minister said to them was that “later he going to work on it”.“The old pump used to supply better water!” another said. “The pressure wasn’t there, but at least you could have drunk the water”, they said.A nurse in the area said that she is not satisfied with the water. “I don’t want water pressure, I want proper water that I can drink and wash my clothes; that my children can drink. I can’t pay water rates when I have to buy water,” she said.“If the water is not ready for us to drink, why would they open the well?”“That is poison water!” said another resident of Canefield.Holding up a bottle of discoloured water, another resident said, “This is the kind of water from the well commissioned today that we will be having?”The situation appeared more chaotic as other concerned residents arrived at the well station, and tried to get Minister Irfaan Ali to give answers about the dirty water.“We ain’t accepting this water at all. The first water was better! You can’t even cook with the water,Cheap Nike Shoes China, and it smelly! [It is a] waste of time, waste of money!” said other residents of New Area Housing Scheme, Canefield.Minister of Housing and Water, Irfaan Ali, who was at yesterday’s commissioning ceremony, admitted that the “redness in the water is not the most desirable situation, when we speak of improved quality and standards, but I want to assure you that it meets all the World Health Organisation (WHO) standards, so it is not harmful to you”.He added that treated water will be extended to many more families in the future. Ali said that 25 per cent of Guyanese had access to treated water prior to 1992.Today, he said, 45 per cent of the people have access to treated water. He hopes that 70 per cent of Guyanese can enjoy treated water in the next five years.He noted that there was no increase in water tariffs and rates during the past years. “Our water rates are the lowest”, he said.The Minister asked residents to conserve water and to ensure they utilize the commodity wisely. “Some persons would leave the overhead tanks to flow for hours, leave the tub with the clothes and the water running over for hours.“This is something that cannot be changed with money, but by personal commitments from all of us to change our behaviour and culture in the way we treat our infrastructure and investment,” he said.He noted that the international view is that the “next big war will be fought over water (and food)”. He said that there are many countries referred to as “water poor” like Barbados. The government, he said, has invested more than $6B in the water sector in Region Six.He added that two other wells, in Manchester and Rose Hall Town, are being prepared. Another at Number 46 Village, Corentyne, will be completed later this year.Minister Ali did not rule out a water treatment plant in the East Canje area, given the “government’s commitment to the people of Guyana”.He said that 98 per cent of the people along Guyana’s coast have access to water, but no more than 50 per cent of them are billed.Project Manager of the Guyana Water Incorporated (GWI), Mr Jailall, said that the new East Canje facility “will boost the level of service in Cumberland East and West…”He said that it was completed to a depth of 750 feet and boasts in excess of 100 feet of screen, used to absorb water through the well, so that it could be pumped to the areas”, he said.Jailall said that the level of service “more than doubled in the surrounding areas”.The project was executed by Nabi Construction Inc and supervised by GWI. |
