Hand en Veldt residents to receive access to potable water for Christmas

– after a decade of being without

Residents of the Hand en Veldt community in Mahaica, Region Five (Mahaica-Berbice), have been promised access to potable water by Christmas this year, after 10 years of being without such.

This promise was made as Guyana Water Inc (GWI) Managing Director, Dr Richard Van West-Charles and technical staff visited the community on Monday to meet with the residents.
The residents had written a letter to the newspapers, complaining about their lack of access to potable water.
They had recently reached out to GWI’s regional office where they received support, and works had commenced shortly thereafter to ensure that they receive access to potable water.
There were, however, some technical challenges along the way, which delayed the installation of the service connections to customers.
The GWI Managing Director explained to the residents that he asked that the company’s technical staff examine the situation, and despite the challenges, the water company would seek every means possible to remedy the situation by Christmas.
Dr Van West-Charles took the opportunity to encourage the residents to firstly register with the regional office as customers, following which they would pay a minimal service connection fee.
He also related to residents that the company would regularly test the water they would receive and the results would be accessible for all to view.
Meanwhile, GWI Executive Director of Operations, Dwayne Shako, told residents that the company would commence the installation of service connections during this week.
Residents also took the opportunity to raise other issues, including leakages and the build-up of rust in the pipe at the end of the water network.
The GWI, in a statement, said it would install a flush-out mechanism to address the latter issue, and would look in to having the other issues resolved.