The BU household commiserates with the people of St.Joseph and the neighbouring parishes who have had to endure extended periods without water. One can only imagine the physical and emotional challenges brought about by the inability of the authorities to deliver potable water.
BU will continue to highlight the matter until there is redress. To be without water for a few hours is an inconvenience, to have intermittent access to for weeks and months is criminal and points to a lack of planing an inept management. The BU household, on behalf of the government of Barbados, apologizes for the poor service being delivered to Barbadian households in St. Joseph an elsewhere.
107 responses to “Josephines, We Feel Your Pain”
Do not RECYCLE this DBLP government of fraud,
Could someone tell me if these smart meters were installed in St. Joseph. I ask that because it was reported that the residents continue to receive water bills for substantial amounts even though they were not receiving water.
What is hypocrtical is that all those who are screaming and making noise and not living in ST. Joseph have yet to organize a water drive to help lessen the pain of the St.Joseph people while govt continue to resolve the technical and mechanical work which will provide a longterm solution
I find it most offensive that Estwick could claim that “he does not make rain so do not blame me” No Estwick you may not be capable of making rain but you do make decisions. You decided to build a $60 million new fancy headquarters – with the executive Chairman having a private shower & bathroom facilities in his luxurious office – my question is why not spend that $60m in replacing the leaking mains and so stop the estimated 50% loss of water currently experienced. I believe that there is sufficient water in the wells but with 50% being lost when there has to be a water shortage. If we really had the Westminster system in Barbados then Estwick should resign, but then again its not his fault. The water shortage in this country is caused by mismanagement not lack of rainfall. Govt should be managing the situation by sending water tankers even if they had to rent them.
This complete lack of management is also being shown by Lowe who is now building the new SSA headquarters for how ever many millions instead of buying new trucks to collect garbage. I wonder if like the calypso says ” steal in dey”
i find it most offensive that the blp operatives would be the ones making the loudest noise when in their fourteen year reign they did not even have the heart to lay a pipe but is using this occasion to stand on a political pipe line to holler and squeal like dirty rats running up and down a sewer line ,
This kind of hypocrisy does not go unnoticed and it would not serve the blp and their operatives or give them any political brownie points.The ongoing deluge of name calling and calls for resignation is as useless to the blp as the rusty pipes they left leaking underground for the st joseph people to retrieve water for their home
this kind of unsavory politics has a short life span for those who seek to receive their fifteen minutes of fame on the pain and suffering of others
Making people pay for a commodity which they are not receiving is tantamount to fraud, and making them pay for the commodity by stating that their water will be cut off if they don’t pay the bills is tantamount to blackmail. How do you expect people to pay such horrendous bills for water if they are not getting it?
I find it offensive that after 8 years to correct problems the previous Govt is still blamed by the present Govt and its supporters for most things in this Country.
The is another ‘side story’ that has come out of the water outage affair in St. Joseph and the related areas. It suggest air is being pushed through the pipes? At worse the BWA should have addressed the issue by now.
how can a meter record water usage if their is no water running through the pipeline to measure the volume amount does not make sense
https://www.facebook.com/BarbadosToday/videos/10154064245693191/
https://www.facebook.com/BarbadosToday/videos/10154065587488191/
yes tron i know you will find what i say offensive about the blp govt lack lustre list of priorities that have helped to negatively impact the Water shortage of the St, Joseph people Have you got no shame to be finger pointing in the first place How do you think the problem occur in the first place.
yes the Blp created this mess which has now turned into a crisis and shamelessly attacks govt efforts to find resolution but does not even have the courage of their own conviction to organize a fund raising event to help the people of St.Joseph, what a shameless spineless political bunch of sewer rats seeking food off the weakness of the vulnerable
@Tudor
Let us assume for legal reasons, I do not speak about Barbados, but about Sicily: A politician who desires power seeks the backing of rich businessmen. Call it a deal. After being elected, the politician does his part of the deal, namely signing a construction contract with the businessmen. Both parties achieved what they wanted: office here, construction there. The outcome: all the money gone.
David
Those new smart meters are not supposed to record the air that passes through the lines when there is an outage. They do not work properly and have been robbing customers from inception.
Sent from my iPad
According to provisional unemployment statistics produced by the Barbados Statistical Service for the period April to June, 2016, the rate of unemployment for the second quarter stood at 10.1%. [Nation News, September 14, 2016]
It is something sickening and saddening when a crisis at home that affects the lives of people can be turned into a political foot ball, and that is what the blp and their operatives has decided in their reaction to the water crisis that has affected the St, Joseph people yet their speak of humanity but where is the blp operatives humanity when they engaged in the most despicable and deplorable political theatrics of giving opinions that have nothing whatsoever to helping the people of St. Joseph get a drink of water
What in heavens name have politics come to when the opposition political party blp ceased a water crisis and try to use it as advantageous political mileage with no respect or caring for those in need Shameless bunch they are
It is a disgrace, from the building to the metres to no water. Bar nothing it is shameful. How some people sleep at night boggles the mind. I guess I forget that if you do not care, you do not feel. Barbados has been taken to such a low.
@Caswell
Do you understand the implication of the comment? It would mean the smart metres are possibly giving flawed readings for all consumers.
There is talk that this reservoir, poorly maintained, that it is too small to service St. Joseph. Does anyone now how water is distributed by the BWA in St.Joseph?
Image Credit: Colonel Buggy
It is something sickening and even more saddening when some try to remove the blame from their own eight years of mismanagement of the country’s affairs. What part of the island being a laughing stock because of opening mouths without putting brain in gear is not clearly understood? Everywhere one turns from one government agency to the next be it education, garbage disposal, water, health and hospital…what has taken place deterioration wise of these basic necessities is simply grim and unacceptable. Stop blaming the world and its non-existent recession, or the other political party. Stop the wastage of money and fix de rass place . JUST FIX THE PROBLEMS
https://www.facebook.com/dale.marshall.737/videos/1080137055440331/
It would be interesting to know the districts of StJoseph with water and those without water.It is nothing short of a disgrace that it’s almost a year these citizens are without water and we have not heard a word on their behalf by that Guyanese pro DLP loudmouth Frank DaSilva.I suppose that former failure of a clothing manufacturer cum “diplomat”who failed to deliver the Fishing Agreement during his tenure,is silent while he helps to suck at the nipples of the Fatted Calf like the other sycophants and hangers on of the DLP inefficient party machinery.May they all burn in hell.The bastids.
@ AC
You pick out ass yardfowl could carry your offensive comments of this posting, your kind of expertise in deception is best suited for the curse DLP up coming manifesto
yes all burn in hell especially the blp bunch of yahoos who now feel the presence of mind to say plenty about the crisis but did nothing in their years of plenty in resolving the water woes of St , Joseph , now believing it is ample time being pressed for time as election draws nigh to open mouth and speak with moral authority about what is wrong and right
AC sounds very much as a docile Chris Stinkler.
Look at these stastics and there relevancy to maintenance and efficiency
In october 2009domestic customers owed 16.36 million dollars or 55.5%of the $29.49million dollars owed to water rates
Commercial customers owed 10.71 million dollars or 36.3% of the total balance
I agreed that the Minister is responsible for the BWA, but the Managers at the BWA are laws unto them self, a Manager at BWA, who I can name, told my friend the Minister can say what he like, he can-not do it , “the it”, is to redress a dangerous situation the BWA created on the man land that remains to this day.The BWA is poorly managed, has been for years, removed the top,
@ ac September 14, 2016 at 9:36 PM
“It is something sickening and saddening when a crisis at home that affects the lives of people can be turned into a political foot ball..”
What crisis are you on about? If there were truly a national water crisis on this 2×3 atoll then the people in all the other parishes would be similarly affected.
It is the lack of political will by way of the practice of garrison-style partisan politics resulting in the failure to keep promises to certain segments to the people of St. Joseph and, more significantly, the glaring inept management at all levels of the BWA that have resulted in this sorry state of abject disgrace to a country approaching 50 years of black political administration and after 150 years of experience (mostly under colonial rule) with water resource management and distribution.
The people of St. Joseph are being denied one of their most basic human rights as enshrined in the United Nations charter.
Barbados is not some backwater African or Asian tribally divided outpost calling itself a nation like South Sudan.
In 1992 Barbados was regarded as the No.1 in the developing world and ranked at No. 20 on the U N Human Development Index after Israel a real water scarce country.
Is this what Barbados has come to under the current leaders of that destructive lying party called the DLP formerly known as the party of the dear loving people?
Don’t be surprised if all this shit(e) ends up in an epidemic outbreak of some disease among the people of St. Joseph as a result of ‘forced poor personal hygiene and dangerously low public sanitation; the effects of which would spread virulently to the other parts of the island before Dr. Denis the Lowedown and Dr. Pit-bull Estwick could shout “St. Joseph”.
Yes DLP leaders, continue to play Russian roulette with the public health of the nation and risk the annihilation of the country’s last remaining economic saviour, Tourism.
The fountain adjacent to the Treasury is not there as a public bath to the vagrants of Bridgetown but as a grim reminder of the deleterious toll on human habitation the lack of clean water for human consumption and proper public sanitation can sometimes exact.
FFS ACs. Don’t you get it? Shut your yardfowl ass mouth about what the BLP did or didn’t do ‘during their 14 years’. THAT WAS NEARLY 9 YEARS AGO AND Y’ALL HAVE DONE SWEET FCK ALL SINCE! Stop blaming everyone else for your utter and complete fck-ups and failures and as your beloved one time leader told you to do, ‘look in the mirror’ and don’t come crying to us if you run screaming from what you see…
http://i.imgur.com/8y9ERa0.jpg?1
It is ironic that the parishes with the greatest rainfall cannot get water.
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David
I fully understand the implications of my comment. Those meters were not tested by any agency in Barbados to verify if they were working properly. The BNSI approved those meters based on a certificate from some entity in Germany. Nobody in this country knows how to calibrate them. The entire country is being robbed by those meters. I challenge anyone at BWA to prove me wrong.
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Caswell Franklyn September 14, 2016 at 7:40 PM #
Yes smart meters were fitted to start with in the sugar Hill area, and at the time while I ,living outside of St Joseph , with no water restrictions, was paying an average of $30 per month, residents in the Sugar Hill and surrounding area were paying from $39 to $60 per month.
Daylight robbery . All it needed was for the Minister to do to the people of St Joseph what he is alleged to have done to Dale Marshall, to make it an Armed Robbery.
ac September 14, 2016 at 9:05 PM #
how can a meter record water usage if their is no water running through the pipeline to measure the volume amount does not make sense.
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The same way that a meter fitted to this lot of minister, will record a high volume of hot air being expelled from them with no substance running through their lines.
Caswell Franklyn September 14, 2016 at 11:05 PM #
I am paying on average $10 more per month since a smart meter was installed. This is in effect, underhand , deceptive rate increase.
The same lackadaisical management style of the BWA that has caused a man to suffered damaged to his home is in progress to the people of St. Joseph, St. James, St. Thomas, St Andrew, leaving them with out water and suffering, that man crying was ignored by a Manager of the BWA who is a better liar, than any of the Minister
This exercise of running a water main from Sweet Vale , past Andrews Factory and through Parris Hill to Castle Grant Reservoir, gave no priority to the people living in Coffee Gully ,Branch Bury and beyond.
All stops were pulled out to get this new water main as far as Blackmans Plantation, this would have ensured that the Central Bank Governor and his neighbours living at Andrews Round Hill, were given an uninterrupted supply. So too, Andrews Plantation Great House, the owner of which ,a Trinidadian , has successfully, through the courts of Barbados , block any further construction of the proposed new Andrews Sugar factory. Just past Parris Hill is another Plantation House,Indian Pond, with some political connections, that also must be supplied. Then there is Blackmans Plantation. After Blackmans Plantation, are those who may best be described, and seen through the eyes of this government, as living in a 2016 Nigger Yard, and therefore are not afforded any level of priority.
This action by the BWA reminds of those days when the electricity supply was run from plantation house to plantation house, passing through villages , cane fields and gullies,but not a connection was made to any of the homes in the villages.
Water is in abundance up to Blackmans Plantation,and this was evident one day while visiting St Joseph ,at a time when most of the homes were ,for days ,out of running water. But at the same time an employee of BWA, was observed washing his hands at knocking off time from a gushing hydrant -type connection.
It is very obvious that our infrastructure is crumbling. We have collectively failed to take care and maintain our schools , homes , churches , beaches, water supply, garbage collection and disposal, Queens Park, Bridgetown, Speightstown, allowed the Empire building to fall into pieces, no maintenance of buses, housing estates, roads, and we can go on and on. Pointing fingers at this stage is not going to solve anything. None of these problems just emerged because the warning signs have been there for at least three decades.
Let us all demonstrate personal pride in our country. Let us resolve as individuals to stop destroying our country.
Well, we all know that old saying that every dog will have his day. This, for me, is one such when I am forced to say to @ac that I agree with her.
@Colonel Buggy
The BWA will respond to you by saying that the old metres were old and inaccurate and likely explain the difference in billing. It is why they had to be changed.
Just so we put this debate in context:
1.the BLP was voted out of office the last two terms
2.the DLP government voted to increase water rates by 60% to support improving water generation and distribution
3.what informed minister David Estwick’s communication at his last press conference that with the boring of the Sweet Bottom well and the location of two temporary desalination plants the water problem should have been alleviated? What has gone wrong?
@William
We elect governments to set policy to deal with an issue like this one. The obvious incompetence exhibited to date merits the kind of public outrage we are seeing in Barbados. Our democracy demands citizen advocacy.
“Amused September 15, 2016 at 2:50 AM #
Well, we all know that old saying that every dog will have his day. This, for me, is one such when I am forced to say to @ac that I agree with her.”
I usually take your comments seriously so to enhance my knowledge I will be grateful if you can share with me the extent of your agreement with what Ac wrote
With the old analogue meter I was paying between $80/$120 a month for water. The new digital meter was installed and I now pay $32 a month. The digital meters do not record air that is forced through the pipes after each burst main repair.
As for them not having been tested by any Bajan authority, they are TUV approved,a testing body far superior to anything we have here.They do not require calibrating as they are solid state and very accurate. Certainly far more accurate than the “old skool” analogue junk.
@balance cann’t u not see where there is not the necessity for political plaver by the blp when the focus on this water shortage should be directly placed on a humanatarian level on the people who are having a hard time receiving water.
What is that to understand? Apparantly we as a society are so hell bent and determined to inflict punishment on ourselves that we cannot become activated by the pain and suffering in a moment of civil transparency to help each other
This issue could have been a shining moment for the leadership of the blp in that she could have played a pivotal role in activating the social conscienous of a nation in helping to do something for the people of St.Joseph but that was not meant to be so ..instead advocate a disconnect to a reality that said the people of ST. Joseph is in need of all of the nations help
Going forward into the next election the importance and relevancy of this water crisis would be those moment built on humanity and not political grandstanding
Do not pay Caswell any mind he sounds off as an authoritarian on those issues he knows nothing about. How the hell is the meter going measure air when they were designed to measure volume in water
@ ac September 15, 2016 at 6:16 AM #
ANALOGUE meters will measure air flow. DIGITAL meters will not. Elementary physics is your friend!
@bookworm
Are you suggesting that smartmetres do not have to be calibrated?
“He said parents wanted the ministry to fix and fill the two water tanks at the school so students and teachers could operate in peace; at least until the water issues plaguing the parish were resolved.”
http://www.nationnews.com/nationnews/news/85525/water-warning#sthash.FZivJPmX.dpuf