The Ministry of Agriculture has dismissed a koker operator owing to negligence in the discharge of his duties and said efforts are being made to have the Hope koker up and running, but Dochfour residents doubt this will get rid of the inches of water flooding their lives with misery and frustration.
Conditions in the area were the same, but when Stabroek News visited the area yesterday residents could be seen moving about as best they could in an attempt to bring some normalcy back into their lives.
“They been digging out the channel by the Hope koker but it still won’t work,” Rahaman Samad said, explaining, “they been digging it from a east to west direction which ain’t going to work…we suggest other methods but no one listening to us.”
Efforts made yesterday to contact Regional Chairman of Region Four (Demerara/ Mahaica) Clement Corlette about the Hope koker issue were futile.
Residents had told this newspaper on Sunday that the Hope koker is the main drainage structure for the area but it has been silted up for several months now. A visit to the koker then revealed that its door was open but the water appeared stagnant. A pump that was stationed there was not in operation at the time and it was explained that when the koker was open, the pump could not be turned on.
In a press release yesterday the Ministry of Agriculture said a National Drainage and Irrigation pontoon was “redeployed to the Hope Outfall to excavate the channel due to heavy siltation that is affecting the operation of the sluice”.
Further, the ministry once again stated that its Crops and Livestock Department has continued its “intense monitoring” and provided technical assistance to farmers and yesterday teams visited the communities of Unity/ Lancaster, Greenfield/Bee Hive, Annandale/Dochfour, Buxton/Vigilance and Bachelors Adventure/ Enterprise/ Paradise.
Farmers in affected areas who are desirous of assistance are urged to contact the officers assigned along the East Coast. Dr. T. Meghoo (622-8264) and Dr. O. Dutson (651-9873).
President Bharrat Jagdeo at a press conference on Saturday at State House had said that government continues to make interventions to enhance drainage in the light of the severe rainfall and at present there are about 50 pumps and 12 excavators working on the East Coast Demerara, twice as much as were working in 2005 when a similar amount of rainfall was experienced.
