President Ali’s promised aid arrives in Kwakwani

─relief distribution begins early Monday morning

Minister of Public Works, Hon. Bishop Juan Edghill will lead a major relief distribution exercise in Kwakwani, Upper Demerara-Berbice (Region Ten) Monday morning.

Minister Edghill arrived in Kwakwani Sunday afternoon, a day after President Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali visited the Region Ten community to assess flood damage and assured residents that aid would get to them quickly.

Upon his arrival, Minister Edghill met the local community council and organised the distribution of much-needed food hampers and cleaning agents for the hundreds of affected residents from areas such as Hururu, its satellite community Bamboo Village and Landern’s Ville. He also checked in on the progress being made with the shelters being built by the Civil Defence Commission (CDC) to house affected families.

“The trucks with the supplies of hampers and cleaning agents have arrived in front of me, so, from the barge we are getting straight to a meeting with all the stakeholders, so that very early in the morning distribution would begin.  

“We want to be able to get supplies all the way down the Berbice River, as far as Calcuni [Wiki-Calcuni] and Wiruni. Basically what we are doing here today is implementing decisions that His Excellency, President Ali made yesterday when he was on the ground,” Minister Edghill stated.

The Works Minister added that Government is currently focused on three areas; ensuring the physical safety of everyone affected, ensuring families do not starve and that they are not further affected by the current pandemic.

“We have to get three responses, one, we have to open shelters, CDC has brought in the supplies, shelters at Landern’s Ville, Hururu and at Kwakwani. We have to be able to get people out of the water; as you can see the houses are all flooded. Secondly, we have to get food to people and we have to get pure water, so we have made arrangements to buy black tanks.”

Minister Edghill noted that water purification tablets were brought to ensure persons are protected from waterborne diseases.

“We don’t want any outbreak of diarrhea or anything of the sort, people must be able to get pure water, people must be able to get food, they must be able to live in safe conditions and we are doing all of this in COVID-19 pandemic environment. So, even putting people in shelters you have to ensure that you are not creating a health risk for people coming into the shelters. We have to get the health teams in place for this as well.”

Flooding in Kwakwani has been caused by heavy rainfall in the last few days, coupled with the swelling and subsequent overflowing of the Berbice River.

Meanwhile, even with the expectation that Monday morning’s exercise will be busy, Minister Edghill said time will be given to further sensitise persons about the COVID-19 vaccine, and those persons eligible, will be encouraged to take the jab to protect themselves and their families against Covid.