Residents haunted by 30-year water crisis

“Well mi a tell you it rough! The water crisis up yah really tough. Mi have to go way down a one spring fi get water,” said Veronica Bryan, a resident of Jambos Pond in Glengoffe, St Catherine, who vented her frustration over a long-standing water crisis that has affected the community for over 30 years.

Residents in the community have been experiencing untold hardships and have not been able to access running water since a water storage tank in the area was destroyed by Hurricane Gilbert in 1988.

The National Water Commission (NWC) said it has renovated the Jambos Pond pumping station, installed a new pump, sterilised the tank, and replaced old water pipes leading into the communities that the system will serve, and is expecting to begin customer engagement soon.

The crisis does not only affect residents of the Jambos Pond system which, if operational, has the capacity to pump water to some six communities that are presently affected, but is widespread across the entire North East St Catherine where a number of natural springs and tributaries exist.

And while the residents are concerned about the health challenges associated with consuming water from these sources, they are forced to go that route when they are not blessed with rainwater.

“When mi have to wash clothes or want drinking water, it hard to carry the water from so far, so mi haff full da black tank deh fi $5,000,” Bryan said, pointing to the tank she acquired to store potable water.

Seventy-five-year-old Delroy Small, who was born in the community, said the long-standing water crisis has greatly affected him over the many decades, and it is a disgrace to know that people still have to use outside latrines.

“We have one spring dun deh so call Mack Eye Spring, a dun deh mi have to ketch water fi most a mi life if rain nuh fall. Dem run new pipe and tell we seh we soon get running water ... a dat we want,” he told The Gleaner.

“Mi can’t believe in a dis modern time even though we house have bathroom in it, we still have to ride bicycle,” said Small amusingly, describing the use of the outside pit latrine.

Acknowledging that there has been a chronic water crisis in the entire North East St Catherine constituency that was inherited, Member of Parliament Kerensia Morrison said the solution lies in harnessing the supply from the natural springs and tributaries, a solution she alluded to in her constituency debate in Parliament.

“I have recommended that upon the provision of funding, there are small water systems in these remote communities that we can harvest and then gravity-fed to the communities, and this may be the long-term solution to the chronic water problem the residents have been facing for decades,” Morrison said.

She said that she has been advised by the NWC that work on the Jambos Pond system is now completed and customer engagement will begin soon.

The Jambos Pond system has also got the attention of the councillor for the Mount Industry division, Roogae Kirlew, who brought the issue to this month’s general meeting of the St Catherine Municipal Corporation.

Kirkew decried the prolonged water crisis in Glengoffe, Jambos Pond and surrounding communities, and questioned the delay in getting the Jombos Pond system operational, given the fact that all the necessary work has been done to get the system going.

He sought the intervention of the Municipal Corporation in the matter, claiming that he has to supply water to the Glengoffe Police Station that has been reeling from the crisis.

Morrison said the delay was caused by a lack of electricity at the Jambos Pond location that she has since been told is now rectified.

ruddy.mathison@gleanerjm.com