Illegal connections affecting water supply

The National Water Commission (NWC) is blaming the illegal connection to the potable water supply network for many of the water supply problems affecting St Elizabeth.

NWC Regional Manager for Manchester and St Elizabeth, Assistant Vice-President Jermaine Jackson, indicates that despite below normal rainfall, most of the water supply systems in both parishes have maintained their normal production outputs.

He maintained that the major problem is a massive increase in the illegal abstraction of water from the NWC pipe network.

So rampant and damaging is water theft in the region that NWC has to dedicate two days out of each week to conduct operations, with police support, to remove illegal connections from the network.

"Many of our customers near the end of our pipeline networks are unable to get water simply because other persons are stealing the water before it gets to them," said Jackson. "For example, we are unable to get water to sections of Bull Savannah because of illegal connections in the area."

The NWC cited the Munro/Malvern Water Supply System. Entrenched illegal connections to the NWC network severely hamper efforts to supply water to communities, including Malvern, Munro, Hampton, Bethlehem, Top Hill, Southfield, Yardley Chase, Portsea, Milksham, Red Bank, Top Flagaman and Round Hill.

As a result of the illegal connections, the NWC has to physically patrol the length of its cross-country transmission pipeline two to three times per month with welding equipment and police security.

Many of the approximately 20 to 30 illegal connections removed on each patrol are used to irrigate fields for legal and illegal farming purposes, a demand for which the potable water system was never designed, in any event.

Jackson also points to the fact that the constant trespass on the transmission pipeline is also threatening the integrity and lifespan of that pipeline and others across the parish.