Ministry closer to securing funds for works on Mahaicony sea defences

The Ministry of Public Infrastructure has moved a step closer to securing funds to execute works on the vulnerable Content, Mahaicony Sea Defences, which pose a threat of flooding to residents in the community and its environs, Sea and River Defence Officer Jermaine Braithwaite has said.

Braithwaite said on Friday that the ministry is finalising the procurement process and has been given the green light from the Ministry of Finance to engage the contractor to initiate works.

Works should commence shortly, he explained, while indicating that they have already instructed the contractor to commence work.

In addition, he said that emergency works at the area were halted due to contractual clauses but that have since been sorted out in order for works to be executed on the stretch of sea defence.

A contractor, this newspaper was told, was deployed to the area to execute shortterm works at the site. However, due to the current spring tide and rains, the contractor was unable to effectively carry out the short-term work.

Stabroek News learnt that the contractor was only able to execute works for four days before the rains began and was forced to move from the site due to the soggy state of the sea dam.

The works executed during that period were washed away after being battered by waves from the Atlantic during the commencement of the spring tide.

Braithwaite nonetheless explained that a team has been deployed to the site to assess the breach which has been rapidly eroding.

A portion of the earthen embankment that creates a sea defence at Content has been rapidly eroding and with recent above-normal high tides, waves from the

Atlantic have been overtopping the dam.

This publication had previously reported that in the work plan, the ministry decided to construct an additional two kilometers of sea defence along the vulnerable Content sea defence.

Residents of Dantzig and Columbia villages in Mahaicony were becoming increasingly alarmed as the sea defences in the area were being increasingly eroded with every passing day.

Since last July, the ministry has been battling an eroding sea defence at

Mahaicony which poses a serious threat to the livelihoods of residents between Fairfield to Columbia.

Several farmers have suffered significant losses as a result of flooding from breaches in sea defence.

During an engagement at the University of Guyana’s 21st installment of its Turkeyen and Tain Talks “Green Building for Resilient Future Cities,” held in November last year, now de-facto Ministry of Public Infrastructure David Patterson, announced that $14 billion was needed between 2020 and 2022 to effect “urgent” repairs to 32.9 kilometers of Guyana’s sea defence.

He had explained that if government fails to execute these works, communities across the coast will suffer a fate similar to that of Mahaicony, East Coast Demerara.

Patterson had explained that the plan of the project at Content, is to construct a rip-rap similar to what was done between the breach at Dantzig and Fairfield. New breaches develop easily, he said, before pointing out that as one area is fixed, the water diverts and undermines other weak sections of the defence, thereby exposing it to rapid erosion.

The mangrove fringe and other natural sea defences that were in place have been washed away, leaving just a narrow dam, which is now exposed and rapidly eroding