Minister Irfaan Ali says he is unhappy about the slothful pace at which the Central Ruimveldt and Sophia Water Treatment facilities are being completed and was emphatic that there would be no further extension of the August deadline.

Both plants have the capacity to produce up to 12 million litres of purified water per day and will enhance the quality and pressure of water to the areas they serve, a Govern-ment Information Agency (GINA) press release said. The $600M project has experienced difficulties and the contractors are currently about four months behind schedule on each of the projects, the Housing and Water minister said.

“We have had a number of meetings with the contractors. We met with the technical team and we are not satisfied with the pace at which the work is going.

The new deadline is August and we are not going to shift that deadline,” Ali said. Contractors were told that “liquidated damages” will be imposed on them “because we have on more than one occasion ex-pressed total dissatisfaction with the progress at which the work is going,” he said. The iron removal treatment plants will serve 23,000 residents of the following areas, Central Ruimveldt, East Ruimveldt, West Ruimveldt, Shirley Field Ridley Square, Roxanne Burnham Gardens, Tucville and South Ruimveldt Gardens while the Sophia facility will benefit 18,000 residents in Lamaha Gardens, Section K Campbellville, Section M Campbellville and Prashad Nagar.

According to GINA currently three other water treatment plants are being built at Lima, Essequibo, Region Two; Vergenoegen, East Bank Essequibo, Region Three and Cotton Tree, Berbice, Region Five to provide safe water to about 48,000 people. This will increase the number of water treatment plants in the country to 22.