Following more than 40 years without potable water, the 3,000 residents of the D’Urban Backlands squatting area, known as ‘Burnham Boulevard,’ in Georgetown, yesterday received 29 standpipes from the Guyana Water Incorporated (GWI).
According to Minister of State Joseph Harmon, this is the first step in government’s plan to regularise the community.
“Water is a right not a privilege…the fact that we are having water in standpipes is not the end of the project. Water is just the first step,” he told residents.
“We need to have water in your homes but to get water in your homes, we need to regularise this community so that you can have a proper address, so that you can have light and all of these amenities which are part of living [a] normal life in GT. I’ve asked the CH&PA to pay attention to this. We cannot have people living in the city of Georgetown and they are living in an unrecognised state. It can’t work. You have the Chinese embassy right there, you have foreigners all over the place, yet here we have an un-regularised community, so I threw out the challenge to GWI and they proved up to it. I’ve also thrown it out to Central Housing and Guyana Lands and Survey and whoever else deals with regularization of communities to ensure this community is regularized in the shortest possible time,” the Minister added.