On her first day in of­fice, Min­is­ter of Rur­al De­vel­op­ment and Lo­cal Gov­ern­ment, Khadi­jah Ameen, con­vened a se­ries of meet­ings with per­ma­nent sec­re­taries and heads of de­part­ment to ad­dress na­tion­al dis­as­ter pre­pared­ness ahead of the rainy sea­son.

Fol­low­ing these dis­cus­sions, Min­is­ter Ameen an­nounced sev­er­al im­me­di­ate ac­tions, in­clud­ing a di­rec­tive to the Dis­as­ter Man­age­ment Unit (DMU) to de­vel­op and sub­mit a com­pre­hen­sive pro­gramme of works fo­cused on flood re­duc­tion in the Ca­roni Riv­er Basin and the Oropouche Riv­er Basin.

Min­is­ter Ameen al­so called for the es­tab­lish­ment of Stan­dard Op­er­at­ing Pro­ce­dures (SOPs) for dis­as­ter shel­ters.

These SOPs are to ad­dress key ar­eas such as shel­ter man­age­ment staffing, es­sen­tial equip­ment, and the pro­vi­sion of nec­es­sary sup­plies.

The mea­sures are in­tend­ed to strength­en the coun­try’s pre­pared­ness sys­tems in ad­vance of the up­com­ing wet sea­son.

Ac­cord­ing to a me­dia re­lease, Min­is­ter Ameen has be­gun co­or­di­nat­ing with tech­ni­cal teams and rel­e­vant de­part­ments to ad­vance im­ple­men­ta­tion of the out­lined rec­om­men­da­tions.