More street lights for Wakenaam
─ every village in Wakenaam has street lighting
─ residents welcome street lighting improvements
DPI, Guyana, Wednesday, March 27, 2019
As promised during a community outreach on the island of Wakenaam by Minister Joseph Harmon, the Government dispatched a second set of street lamps to the island. The lamps are already mounted on electric poles around the island.
Wakenaam Community Development Officer and Regional Councillor Perry Birbal expressed appreciation on behalf of the Islanders for the promise fulfilled by and indicated that all villages on the island are currently enjoying street lighting.
“When I read sometime back about LED lights coming to Guyana, I immediately penned a letter to the ministers making that representation for residents on the island. Today I am happy after the visit of Minister Harmon to say that the lights are here and all communities are lit up. The Government of Guyana has fulfilled its promise to the people of Wakenaam and for that, we are very grateful,” Birbal noted.
Stanley Dash, a resident from Belle Plaine said, “Right now we feel like Georgetown. Not only them in brightness, we too on the island of Wakenaam and I must say that I have noticed that Government is trying its best to provide the improved facilities to the far-flung areas which is good. We are all people and the same treatment the Georgetown people getting we must get too. Thank you, President Granger.”
Perry Birbal also highlighted some of the many developments on the island which includes a facelift to schools on the island, two state-of-the-art laboratories for the benefit of students at the Essequibo Islands Secondary School, bridges and culverts, upgrade of equipment and infrastructure at the Wakenaam Cottage Hospital, improved playfields at Maria Johanna and Arthurville and sound infrastructural sea defence work that is currently ongoing around the island.
In accordance with President David Granger’s push for a ‘Green Agenda’ for Guyana, the Ministry of Public Infrastructure is working to replace thousands of sodium-vapour lamps (commonly known as orange street lamps) with the more efficient LED lamps. The LED’s also assist in the reducing of carbon footprints.
Since coming into office in 2015, several communities along the Essequibo Coast and the Corentyne have been outfitted the LED street lamps.
Story and Images: Ganesh Mahipaul.