KAY-MARIE FLETCH­ER

Se­nior Re­porter

kay-marie.fletch­er@guardian.co.tt

Af­ter be­ing with­out wa­ter for months, res­i­dents of Freeport and en­vi­rons are hap­py they fi­nal­ly have a con­sis­tent wa­ter sup­ply.

This comes less than two weeks af­ter the Wa­ter and Sew­er­age Au­thor­i­ty (WASA) com­mis­sioned three new wells in Freeport.

When Guardian Me­dia vis­it­ed the area yes­ter­day, some res­i­dents re­called how it had been a re­al strug­gle to do sim­ple but im­por­tant tasks such as wash­ing their chil­dren’s clothes.

Oth­er res­i­dents said they are re­lieved that the wa­ter came in time for the Di­vali and Christ­mas hol­i­days.

Speak­ing to Guardian yes­ter­day, 60-year-old Cal­cut­ta Road Num­ber Two res­i­dent, David Sook­lal said, “Since last week, we get­ting wa­ter right through. Up to this morn­ing, it have wa­ter... It com­ing re­al hard. You could wash your clothes and thing every day now, be­cause you get­ting wa­ter every­day.”

Freeport res­i­dent Ter­rence Mc Field said he has three tanks but even that was not suf­fi­cient to wash clothes for his fam­i­ly every week. Now he is hap­py things have changed.

“I used to get so mad, when­ev­er I call WASA hot­lines, I used to get so mad with the peo­ple on the phone be­cause they al­ways telling me wa­ter com­ing Tues­day, and when Tues­day come, no wa­ter. Then tell say it com­ing next week, and so they go­ing. Things change a lot now. It’s a lot bet­ter now. Ba­si­cal­ly, we get it every day now... I am pleased. Right now they get­ting wa­ter in the lines there,” he added.

But speak­ing with Guardian Me­dia via phone yes­ter­day, Cou­va South MP Rudranath In­dars­ingh said the sit­u­a­tion is not per­fect. He said the wells have on­ly led to re­quests for truck-borne wa­ter to be re­duced.

“The com­plaints have less­ened sig­nif­i­cant­ly. How­ev­er, ar­eas such as Nadi­ra Gar­dens, (res­i­dents) said things have wors­en since the com­mis­sion­ing of the wells,” he claimed.

On the oth­er side of the high­way, Cou­va North res­i­dents al­so com­plained of not hav­ing wa­ter.

One Wa­ter­loo res­i­dent al­so told Guardian Me­dia her com­mu­ni­ty has not had wa­ter for the past three months.

On No­vem­ber 8, WASA com­mis­sioned three wells to boost sup­ply to 21,000 res­i­dents in com­mu­ni­ties in­clud­ing Freeport, Bras­so, Gran Cou­va, Cal­cut­ta Road #1 and #2, Siew­dass Road, Chick­land and Preysal.

Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Mar­vin Gon­za­les, who cham­pi­oned the com­mis­sion­ing of the new wells in Freeport, said In­dars­ingh need­ed to do re­search be­fore he made “ir­re­spon­si­ble state­ments.”

Re­spond­ing to the MP’s claims, Gon­za­les said he con­tact­ed WASA for more in­for­ma­tion and was told by a se­nior area man­ag­er that the ar­eas said to be ex­pe­ri­enc­ing wa­ter woes, like Wa­ter­loo, were not served by the Freeport wells.

He added, that the au­thor­i­ty has been do­ing checks in Freeport and the wells have been an “over­whelm­ing suc­cess for the 21,000 res­i­dents who for the first time in 20 years have wit­nessed and ex­pe­ri­enced that im­prove­ment in sup­ply.”