Sewage challenge being addressed
Prime Minister Freundel Stuart is giving Barbadians the assurance that his Government is not treating the issue relative to the challenges being experienced by the South Coast Sewage Treatment Plant lightly.
While admitting that the challenges with the plant need to be eliminated, he made it clear that Government will not “wildly throw money” at it. The Prime Minister also pointed out while contending that it is a “very serious agenda item” that is engaging his Cabinet on a weekly basis. Prime Minister Stuart’s comments came as he revealed that Government has sought assistance from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to help fix the problem once and for all. He said the IDB has pledged to assist the country at every stage of the process to help bring an end to the problem currently plaguing the South Coast of the island.
His remarks came as he explained that an attempt was previously made to rectify the problem with the plant, and though all indications suggested it would work, it failed. He explained that the effort involved the purchasing of technology, acquired with the help of the Barbados Tourism Investment Inc. which advanced $4 million to the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) to pay for it. He said it was then on Independence Day last year that he received a “panicked call” that the problem recurred.
At that time, he explained that he made immediate contact with the Minister of Finance, Christopher Sinckler who was attending a meeting of the IDB in The Bahamas, and asked him to make an intervention on the country’s behalf, asking for experts from the IDB’s water and sanitation department to visit the country and offer advice on the way forward. He explained that at that time the BWA was also engaging consultants from Trinidad and Tobago and the IDB requested that their report also be sent to them for review.
“The report eventually came in, combined reports from the Trinidad consultants and the Barbados Water Authority were sent off to the Inter-American Development Bank [and] as recently as today [Wednesday] their report was sent back to us. They asked some additional questions because they say we have to get this right. It cannot be allowed to continue as a problem that is a source of irritation to people from day to day. When you tackle it, you have to tackle it in such a way that a final solution is secure,” he said.
He gave the assurance that Government will be following up on the IDB’s request shortly, and in the meantime efforts are being made to put mitigation measures in place in the short-term to bring relief.
(JRT)