Gov’t says City Council can do more to minimize floods
-Local gov’t body seeks answers on action against pump attendants
Citing concern over the recent flash flooding in Georgetown, the government yesterday met with the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) on solutions, while demanding that pump attendants be better supervised and held accountable where they are found to be negligent.
A delegation comprising government ministers and other officials met with the mayor and other city officers at the Ministry of Agriculture’s boardroom.
Agriculture Minister Zulfikar Mustapha subsequently told a media briefing that the meeting was held as the government is very concerned after the flooding experienced on Tuesday and Wednesday and he argued that the amount of rainfall experienced should not have affected the city to the extent that it did.
He noted that over the past month the Ministry of Agriculture and other government agencies have been involved in making visits to several locations in the city, to ensure that the equipment provided to the city council is being used to drain the city and that the sluices are open to prevent flooding.
However, Mustapha said to their dismay it was observed that there is no supervision of the equipment and the operators. Instead, he said, it is being left to operators to determine when and if the sluices and the pumps will be operated.
In order to ensure that pump attendants are being held to account, the Local Government Commission subsequently wrote the acting Town Clerk Sherry Jerrick and requested that she provide information on actions taken against the pump attendants found negligent in executing their duties, resulting in flooding in many areas around Georgetown.
The letter, released to the media, refers to the underperformance of pump attendants at pump stations under the remit of the Mayor and City Councillors. “It is the duty of the Pump Attendants and Sluice Operators to ensure that the pumps and sluices are attended to promptly to avoid an unusually high accumulation of water which could result in flooding to the residents,” the letter notes, while adding that this task was not taken seriously as seen during a visit by the President and more recently by the Minister of Agriculture to the pump stations within Georgetown. Several media reports highlighted that pump attendants were sleeping or not present at their posts, the letter further said.
In addition to the action taken against negligent pump attendants, the Commission also asked the Town Clerk to state what plans, if any, would be put in place to address the current and future flooding of the city.
Mustapha said the government is making the resources available to the council and pointed out that it increased the capacity of the town through three additional pumps in November of last year, while ensuring that all the sluices are serviced.
He said the work being done is a part of the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority budget and added that the council’s only job is to ensure it supervises the operators and reports when equipment is not functioning properly.
On this point, Mustapha highlighted that there were no reports of any defective pumps on Wednesday but a visit to several locations uncovered that three pumps had developed mechanical issues. Two of those pumps have since been fixed.
Additionally, Mustapha disclosed that during a late night visit on Wednesday the technical persons who were there to monitor the pumps found out that the pump at Young Street was turned off and the sluice closed, hindering drainage work. Two other pumps
were also turned off and the operators were absent, he added. As a result, he said a system has been implemented whereby persons are tasked with checking the pump stations on a 24-hour basis and the action will continue until a proper solution is found.
Mustapha maintained that if the systems given to the council were in action the flooding situation could have been minimized. He also said that should there be a point where the government has to take over the system in the city, there would be a plan to manage it.
‘Not a political problem’
According to Mustapha, Georgetown Mayor Ubraj Narine stated that the technical persons in the council are the ones responsible for the supervision. However, the minister said he found the mayor’s response strange since the responsibility stops at the mayor’s desk. He added that it was the mayor’s job to ensure that the supervision in the town is effective and that all systems are in place.
In response, Narine later said that he drew the ministers’ attention to the fact that from 2015 to 2019 the government and the municipality worked together to ensure the residents and businesses of Georgetown are not significantly affected by flooding during the rainy season.
A statement issued by Narine’s office said he urged the ministers to avoid making the decades-old problem of the flooding of Georgetown into a political one and said that he preferred a solution-based approach. He said that the capital lies below sea level and the effects of climate change continue to see above-normal rainfall compromising archaic infrastructure. He also stressed that only a collaborative approach will ensure that citizens are kept safe and damage and inconvenience reduced.
“The M&CC requires over a billion dollars annually to clear and maintain the drainage canals and kokers, and over 500 million dollars to maintain the pumps. The municipality collects just over 700 million dollars annually in taxes of which 264 million dollars are required to dispose of residential and commercial solid waste,” the statement added, while also noting the need for changing the city bylaws to increase revenue collection in order to enable the council to adequately fulfil its mandate.
Narine added that the council is continuing to prepare for the rainy season with emergency allocations and requests collaboration with all agencies.
Echoing Mustapha, Local Government Minister Nigel Dharamlall stated that central government has invested close to a billion dollars in the city. He said that it is the central government who is doing the heavy lifting in Georgetown and had expected that the city council would engage in the sustainable management of the facilities put in place.
He alluded to the alleyways in the city, most of which he said are not being cleaned and are still clogged.
He said in collaboration with the Ministry of Local Government and Public Works last December, some cleaning works were undertaken in south and north Georgetown, and presently they are engaged in cleaning south Georgetown and Sophia in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture.
Minister within the Ministry of Public Works Deodat Indar, in a brief comment, highlighted the vegetation issue that is preventing the draining of the water.