EXTREMELY high tides, early yesterday morning, have left several farms and Hackney Primary School in Pomeroon under some four feet of water.
Chairman of Region Two (Pomeroon/Supenaam), Mr. Alli Baksh, accompanied by Pomeroon representative on the new Guyana Marketing Corporation (GMC) Board, Mr. Ayube Khan, paid an emergency visit and met with affected farmers and residents to discuss relief measures.
Baksh, who inspected several farms, was told that water in Pomeroon River kept rising to alarming levels since Thursday afternoon.
One farmer, Gobin (only name stated) said the water flowed over the river defence dam and a stelling and flooded his farm.
He said, during his 35 years of farming in Pomeroon, he never before witnessed such a high level of water in the river.
Another member of the GMC and former councillor of the Regional Democratic Council, (RDC), Mrs. Vilma DaSilva, who also plants, said she, too, found the tide level unprecedented in 30 years.
She said the entire Pomeroon area is under severe threat of flooding and told Baksh her cultivation is also inundated.
At Hackney Primary School, the whole compound is flooded and, during his inspection, Baksh stood in almost one foot deep water in the lower flat of the two-storey building as he helped to secure some text books.
But desks and benches as well as teaching aids on the wall, teachers’ tables and chairs and cupboards were all submerged in water.
The Headmistress, Ms. Verna Jack said the water in that bottom flat rose more than two feet yesterday morning as she and teachers attempted to save some books and foodstuff.
Baksh spoke to her, some teachers and children, who reported for classes despite the flood, in the upper flat.
People’s National Congress Reform (PNCR) RDC Councillor, Mr. Rudolph Garraway said he was very glad to see Baksh in the Hackney area, having a first hand look at the situation.
Garraway said his farm and those of his neighbours were under four feet of water, a level he has not experienced in for 40 years and his recently built defence was no match for the tide.
His crops, which include suckers, avocado pear, coconut and ground provisions, were all under water.
Several other schools, Liberty and St. John’s among them, were all closed and Baksh expressed his displeasure at seeing the self-acting door on a box culvert, that drains water from Hackney School compound, not functioning properly.
He said the Regional Administration will have to remedy the situation but advised that members of the Parent Teachers Association (PTA) should help with the repair to prevent similar occurrence in future.