Dear Editor,
The Government of Guyana is known to be the first to come up with skullduggeries to camouflage its incompetence and wrongheadedness; but this unprecedented maneuver to build and operate its own bottled water plant has to take the cake as the big stunt to distract from its gross incompetence, failure, and dereliction of duty of a normal Govt to perform its paramount function of delivering a clean municipal water supply system to its citizens. Along with clean air, clean water is the most indispensable necessity for sustaining life, but unfortunately, this Govt has botched the God-given gift of being the land of many waters; or, as the famous Poet, Samuel Coleridge puts it “water, water, everywhere, but not a drop to drink.”
This desperate move signifies the Govt’s confession of its lack of ability to perform this basic function, while callously caring less about the extra arm and leg expences to be faced by the poverty stricken making up 60% of the population, who will be forced to purchase this water, accompanied by the retrograde step of going back to the days of fetching water in bottles, then transferring to buckets and calabash for bathing, in lieu of showering. In contrast, the minority well to do friends and families of the Boys, will continue their merry affluent life styles enjoying in-house water treatment furnishing not only clean pipe water for their showering, but also for their clean dishes and laundry.
The Guyanese people no doubt welcomes the outcries by the Guyana Manufacturing and Services Association (GMSA) and the Opposition against this endeavor that threatens private enterprises, and which exposes the fakery that the PPPC had somehow converted itself from communism/socialism to capitalism. However, this unheard-of action flies in the face of a Govt’s moral imperative to guarantee a reliable and convenient pure water supply system to sustain all life and health for its people, which is far more vital than commercial interests.
Not surprisingly, the Govt openly entertains the commercial argument so as to get out of jail free by switching the conversation to distract from its obvious dereliction of duty for 29 years to carry out this most basic function, despite being handed a functional modern water system which they ran into the ground, resulting in the current discharge of unhealthful, toxic and discoloured pipe water 630 times more acidic than safe drinking water (see my July 10, 2026 Letter to the Editor “GWI’s statement is irresponsible, callous and dangerous – water 630 times safe limit”).
Most despicably, though the GWI’s own laboratory water analyses show the water to be irrefutably unsafe and unfit for sanitary consumption, the Govt continues to claim that it is clean. In other words, condescendingly berating the public that they must not believe their own eyes, and don’t believe GWI’s own laboratory data.
That being the case, the President, Minister Indar, and/or the GWI CEO must drink in front of nation, the same water that they deem clean and which they implore the public to drink.
How unfathomable is it that a government could lack the ability to provide a potable water supply system to its nation dubbed as the land of many waters, despite inheriting an oil bonanza that triggered the fastest growing economy in the world, and a national budget that increased by more than 5 times to $1.6 Trillion since taking office. Not to mention that 60% of this humongous budget goes into infrastructure with wastage of a whopping 45%.
Owing to its proven incompetence, incapabilities, and ill-suited budgetary priorities as evidenced by its failures, the Govt seemingly had to resort to this alternative upon surrendering its failed efforts to mete out a universally traditional municipal water system, though drowning in resources to do so. For instance, as published by DPI on November 17, 2022, the Govt awarded contracts totaling $40 Billion to upgrade 12 water plants, and construct 7 new ones where “300,000 customers will be the beneficiaries of an improved water supply”.
Most notably, all of these improvements were slated for the PPP areas of Regions 3, 6 and the East Bank and East Coast of Demerara, with none in Linden with its five decrepit plants evidenced by the very poor and unhealthy water quality recently published by the Public Utilities Commission (PUC).
Notwithstanding these massive expenditures targeted to PPPC constituents, the water quality continues to get patently worse, no doubt the reason for resorting to this bottled water trick, unmindful of the added negative impacts to the business sector, and the added financial hardships and inconvenience to the majority poor.
Taking the Plant on its face value, there appears to be no basis for its $500 Million estimated cost which is guaranteed to end up at least two to three times higher, based upon the Govt’s track record; thus, in the interest of transparency, the Govt must inform the people of the following:
- What was the basis for the $496 Million estimate?
- What will be the added costs to each household for purchasing this water for drinking, bathing, laundry, and other sanitary purposes?
- What is the procedure for conducting water sampling analyses representative of the entire distribution system?
- The PUC must publish on a monthly basis, the water quality analyses in #4.
Sincerely,
Dr. Vincent Adams
