Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

Min­is­ter of Pub­lic Util­i­ties Bar­ry Padarath says wa­ter dis­tri­b­u­tion and in­creas­ing pro­duc­tion ca­pac­i­ty na­tion­wide re­main per­sis­tent chal­lenges for the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) in 2026.

He made the com­ment dur­ing a walk­a­bout in his con­stituen­cy at Bal­main Vil­lage, Cou­va, yes­ter­day.

Padarath said three ma­jor de­sali­na­tion plants are planned this year in Ma­yaro, Moru­ga/Table­land, and Char­lot­teville, To­ba­go. He not­ed the coun­try’s over-re­liance on the Navet Dam and the Ca­roni Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant, adding that the new plants in Ma­yaro and Moru­ga should ease de­mand on both fa­cil­i­ties.

Padarath al­so said WASA will be­gin re­plac­ing old wa­ter lines, a move aimed at pre­vent­ing land­slides and re­duc­ing potable wa­ter loss­es caused by leaks. In ad­di­tion, he not­ed that a new tank farm fa­cil­i­ty is ex­pect­ed to be launched lat­er this week in Siparia and sur­round­ing ar­eas.

Mean­while, Padarath al­so said res­i­dents of Cou­va South had ex­pressed sup­port for the Gov­ern­ment’s stance on the sit­u­a­tion in Venezuela. He said many res­i­dents are pleased with the lead­er­ship demon­strat­ed by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

“Peo­ple are very vo­cal about the lead­er­ship of the ho­n­ourable Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, our Prime Min­is­ter, in terms of the po­si­tion she has adopt­ed both re­gion­al­ly and in­ter­na­tion­al­ly. We want to con­grat­u­late and thank her for that lead­er­ship.

“I think she has stood very strong and con­tin­ues to do so on this is­sue, as well as in re­la­tion to T&T’s own se­cu­ri­ty chal­lenges. The Prime Min­is­ter has been very clear since day one that we con­tin­ue the fight against gun traf­fick­ing, drug traf­fick­ing and nar­co-traf­fick­ing,” he said.

Speak­ing about the rea­son for the walk­a­bout, Padarath said the Prime Min­is­ter has man­dat­ed that all MPs re­main con­nect­ed to their con­stituents, lis­ten­ing to their con­cerns about na­tion­al is­sues and in­fra­struc­ture. He said this en­gage­ment will con­tin­ue in the months and years ahead.