MINISTER within the Ministry of Agriculture Hon. Alli Baksh yesterday morning visited the community of Peter’s Hall in wake of the recent koker breach which saw the community being inundated by water from the sea.

At approximately 16:00hrs Thursday afternoon, water from the Demerara River caused major flooding in the community.
During the visit, Minister Baksh met with residents of the community while inspecting urgent remedial works being undertaken by a team of engineers from the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA).

Minister Baksh added that while all measures are being put in place to remedy the situation to ensure that the water recedes effectively, he cautioned persons not to create a mode of panic by misrepresenting the situation.

“All measures are being put in place to ensure that the water recedes effectively… Thus far, the boards on the koker were replaced and personnel are working around the clock to ensure that the water effectively drains off-land and in a timely manner, ” Minister Baksh said.
Chief Executive Officer, NDIA, Mr. Lionel Wordsworth and a team of engineers are on site to ensure that the situation returns to normalcy. The team is working on installing stop logs to stop the flow of water from the Demerara river during the high tide, a mobile pump was also installed yesterday(October 9, 2014) to ensure the continual drainage of the affected areas.
Also we are assiduously working to construct a new sluice door and affect some remedial structural repair to the sluice within the week.
The Ministry of Agriculture would also like to assure the public that the situation is under control and for persons to take all precautionary measures.

Hundreds of residents residing in west Peter’s Hall and west Providence lost millions of dollars in damaged property after the main koker that separates the two villages collapsed on Wednesday afternoon causing the entire western part of the villages to be flooded, with water reaching 3.5 feet in most homes.
Among the damaged items were fridges, television sets, couches, poultry, glass wares, carpets, etc. Many students and workers had to stay at home to help clean up after the flood; and most elderly persons in the villages were seen in tears.
One resident who was at the koker yesterday morning told the Chronicle that the incident occurred around 16:30hrs on Wednesday ; he said that when he heard that the koker door was broken, he waited till the water cleared up and went to assist in helping to repair the koker door since he knows a little about it.

“I won’t lie, everybody blaming the engineer for the delay in fixing the koker, but what they don’t understand is that when the door collapse it fell into the groove security of the koker which made it take about five hours to come out, it’s not as if things like this don’t happen, this is God work we need to be prepared for any disaster,” the resident said.
Another resident said that this is the fourth time the koker has collapsed since 1998; he added that when the koker had collapsed in 2008, it wasn’t bad as Wednesday’s.
“This is the fourth time this happen since 1998; it could have been prevented but the engineers who were working to fix the koker on Wednesday night were apparently under the influence of alcohol, it was three of them, they didn’t even have lights and also they cut the woods extra short

which delayed the work more, if they did do the work properly nothing like this would have happened,” the resident concluded.
Another resident, Ms. Bibi Haniff , who was frustrated said that she was at work when the koker collapsed; she said that when she came home all her belongings were damaged and she could not have done anything since she was left in a state of shock.
“My fridge, my bed, my clothes, my wares everything is damaged. I live in a flat house, who will help me now? I’m a single parent and it’s going to be hard for me,” Haniff said.

An elderly resident, who lives very close to the koker, recalled her experience at the time of the breach. She said, “All of a sudden I heard something making noise; when I do realise I started to see water started to rush in my house with its power, right away I remember the movie Titanic and I was wondering if Jack would have been here to save me, because everything started to fall to the ground and broke, I could not have helped myself.”