RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Bal­anc­ing emp­ty buck­ets on their heads, res­i­dents of San Fran­cique, Pe­nal staged a noisy protest yes­ter­day to high­light wa­ter prob­lems in their area.Led by Coun­cil­lor Dood­nath Mayrhoo, res­i­dents of An­tilles Trace and De­osaran Trace, who claim they have not re­ceived pipe-borne wa­ter since last month, called on the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) to im­me­di­ate­ly re­store their sup­ply.

One of the af­fect­ed res­i­dents, Par­batie De­osaran, said al­though they pay their WASA bills they were suf­fer­ing for wa­ter and have to pay $300 for a truck­load of wa­ter from pri­vate con­trac­tors.

“This is not fair to us. We al­ways try­ing to economise on wa­ter but we need wa­ter to wash our clothes. The chil­dren have to go to work and school and it is re­al­ly hard when we have no wa­ter,” she con­tend­ed.

Dou­bles ven­dor Pe­tra Par­tap, who has al­so been buy­ing wa­ter, com­plained: “Every oth­er day we have to buy wa­ter be­cause we do two shifts of dou­bles. If we get wa­ter every two weeks, it will be good. But when we not get­ting wa­ter for months it is hard.” 

Par­tap said she has to go to a rel­a­tive’s home to do her laun­dry.

“When we call the truck we don’t al­ways get wa­ter the same day. WASA has to do bet­ter and send wa­ter to us,” she ex­plained.

Res­i­dent Nir­mal De­osaran said De­osaran Trace has been hard hit by the wa­ter short­age.

“WASA turn­corks are not re­leas­ing the wa­ter pres­sure so we can­not get wa­ter on the hill. If they open the line hard­er we will get. It makes no sense you buy ten tanks and WASA is not giv­ing you enough wa­ter to fill one tank,” he ex­plained.

Mayrhoo said there have been wa­ter prob­lems for more than a month in An­tilles Trace, De­osaran Trace, Ten­ant Hill, Pluck Road and Ram­cha­ran Trace.

“I do not know why this gov­ern­ment is so heart­less. Wa­ter is life and they should have this 24/7 wa­ter sup­ply. These res­i­dents are still be­ing le­nient say­ing they would be hap­py to get wa­ter once a week.

“At least give them wa­ter once a week. My un­der­stand­ing is they can­not open the pres­sure be­cause the pipes will rup­ture,” he added.

When con­tact­ed, Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les re­vealed the wa­ter dis­rup­tions oc­curred on May 17 af­ter a pipeline was dis­lodged by a Min­istry of Works con­trac­tor re­pair­ing a 200-foot land­slip. He said 45 hous­es were af­fect­ed.

“The last time res­i­dents had pipe-borne wa­ter was on May 17 un­til 6 pm when the pipeline was dis­lodged,” he ex­plained.

Gon­za­les said WASA pro­vid­ed truck-borne wa­ter to 23 hous­es but oth­er house­hold­ers could not get a sup­ply be­cause the trucks had dif­fi­cul­ties get­ting to them.

He added that wa­ter truck­ing will con­tin­ue and the pipeline will be re­in­stat­ed by Tues­day. The min­is­ter said he was baf­fled as to why res­i­dents were not told about the dis­lodged pipeline.

“I would like to call up­on the coun­cil­lor to stop us­ing peo­ple as po­lit­i­cal tools, es­pe­cial­ly when the facts are well known. That is ir­re­spon­si­ble be­hav­iour and it will not in any way in­tim­i­date me or shake my re­solve,” Gon­za­les said.