Agriculture Minister, Zulfikar Mustapha on Tuesday returned to Providence and Peter’s Hall on the East Bank of Demerara to meet with residents who were severely affected by flooding over the weekend.
During the visit, Minister Mustapha distributed food hampers to those who were affected and gave an update on some of the immediate interventions to combat flooding which was due to continuous rainfall over.
Approximately 300 hampers containing essential food items were distributed to affected households.
While engaging members of the media, Minister Mustapha indicated that as a result of the high intensity of rainfall many areas across the Coast had experienced flooding and that the government was working to address the problem and strengthen the drainage system.
While speaking specifically about the situation along the East Bank of Demerara, he said many persons in Providence and Peter’s Hall were severely affected and sought assistance with cleaning and grocery hampers.
“As a result of the flooding, many persons lost groceries and other items so I am here today to distribute grocery hampers. The CDC also distributed hampers with cleaning agents yesterday. When we were here last Saturday, we said systems would be put in place to minimize the flooding. We did so and now most of the areas are dry. With these interventions, persons should not experience any flooding for the rest of the season.,” the minister said.
As it relates to interventions to combat flooding in vulnerable areas along the East Bank of Demerara, Minister Mustapha said the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) has engaged the Neighborhood Democratic Councils and that meaningful solutions are being explored.
“We are working to put systems in place so that we can have permanent solutions to flooding here. I’ve asked the NDC to submit a programme to the ministry so that we can look at desilting the major canals in the area. We also installed a 40cu-sec pump at the Peter’s Hall sluice that is capable of pumping 21,000 gallons of water per minute. When the sluice is closed it will complement the drainage system so we should not have any major flooding in this area. Pumps were also installed in other areas on the East Bank of Demerara so we’ll continue to monitor the situation within those areas,” he noted.
Last Saturday, sections of Peter’s Hall and Providence were flooded following hours of rainfall. Many homes were inundated which prompted officials from the NDIA to deploy mobile pumps to compliment the drainage capacity of the Peter’s Hall sluice.
As of Tuesday, most of the affected areas were drained following timely interventions by the Ministry.
