THE EDITOR, Sir:
I FEEL constrained to respond to some comments suggesting that the National Water Commission and/or the Ministry of Water and Housing had no plan in place to deal with the devastation caused by Hurricane Ivan.
For your information, the National Water Commission does have a detailed disaster preparedness and response procedure. In fact, it was the implementation of the procedures prior to, during and since Hurricane Ivan, that has enabled the Commission to now have back in operation a record 80 per cent of its production capacity so soon after the hurricane's devastation.
Preparatory steps were taken before the onset of Hurricane Ivan; several employees manned critical facilities, including our control centre, throughout the hurricane; and even before the hurricane warnings had lifted on Saturday, September 11, the NWC's president, chief engineer and other senior managers braved the rains and winds and met to begin the process of restoration. The management also constantly kept the Minister of Water and Housing advised as to the steps being taken.
While your writers are fully entitled to their opinion (based in fact or otherwise), we find it most unfortunate that the Minister of Water and Housing and National Water Commission should be disparaged in this unfortunate way in the face of our strenuous and unrelenting effort and I might say successfully too to bring water supply back to normal in record time.
We are, etc.,
NATIONAL WATER
COMMISSION
Charles Buchanan
Corporate public relations
manager
