Rad­hi­ca De Sil­va

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­ca.sookraj@guardian.co.tt

Protest fires burned in sev­er­al parts of Trinidad as res­i­dents con­tin­ue to clam­our for wa­ter.

Wa­ter scarci­ty start­ed in late Au­gust with elec­tri­cal mal­func­tions at both the Ca­roni Wa­ter Treat­ment plant and the de­sali­na­tion plant in Point Lisas. Even though these prob­lems were rec­ti­fied, wa­ter sup­plies con­tin­ue to be se­vere­ly im­pact­ed.

Among the ar­eas blocked by pro­test­ers are Bris­tol Vil­lage, Ma­yaro, Union Vil­lage, Pe­nal Rock Road, Pluck Road, San Fran­cique and Mun­gal Trace, Wood­land.

At Pe­nal, the protest fires start­ed af­ter dawn.

At Pluck Road San Fran­cique, res­i­dents al­so set up plac­ards along the street as they clam­ored for wa­ter.

At Wood­land, res­i­dents came out with their buck­ets and emp­ty bar­rels.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia, res­i­dent An­ju Mun­gal said, " We have not had wa­ter in six weeks. Why is this so?"

An­oth­er res­i­dent Ricky Ram­dass said res­i­dents were suf­fer­ing be­cause of the wa­ter cri­sis.

"WASA dig up the road to make con­nec­tions but they have done noth­ing yet. We are fed up with this sit­u­a­tion," Ram­dass said.

At Wood­land, Moohanie Ran­jit of La For­tune said peo­ple on her street have not re­ceived wa­ter for three months.

"We pay­ing our bills and we still not get­ting wa­ter. When we asked WASA they said they would open the valve but we still not get­ting any," she said.

Pres­i­dent of the Wood­land Flood Ac­tion Group Adesh Singh said some parts of Wood­land got a pipe-borne sup­ply but the wa­ter pres­sure was so low that peo­ple could bare­ly fill a bar­rel.

Mean­while, re­spond­ing to the protests in his con­stituen­cy, Ma­yaro MP Rush­ton Paray said the in­ef­fi­cien­cies of WASA, stemmed from un­re­solved en­gi­neer­ing chal­lenges.

" The San Pe­dro Boost­er has been a prob­lem­at­ic source, with WASA grap­pling with acute pres­sure com­pli­ca­tions, mak­ing it ar­du­ous to en­sure wa­ter reach­es Ma­yaro and its ad­join­ing com­mu­ni­ties," Paray re­vealed. He said he has begged WASA to bol­ster the quan­ti­ty and reg­u­lar­i­ty of Wa­ter Truck­ing Ser­vices to com­pen­sate for these dis­tri­b­u­tion chal­lenges but the re­sponse was poor.

He called for the op­er­a­tional­is­ing of the Petro Guaya Ser­vice, com­mis­sion­ing a new Wa­ter Treat­ment Plant, draw­ing from the Or­toire Riv­er, and lay­ing down a nov­el 14-inch line stretch­ing from Navet to Table­land, which would fa­cil­i­tate un­in­ter­rupt­ed ac­cess to the ex­ist­ing line to Rio Claro.