"Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink..." it's an old refrain and tonight it's just the plain truth in Progresso Village. Yesterday, our team went north to the southern edge of the Corozal District where we found villagers that have been living without running water for three solid weeks. We found out why.
Jules Vasquez Reporting,
It is a
village known for its water, specifically the spectacular Progresso Lagoon. And true, as the waves crash on the shore there is water in abundance, and a water system, complete with reservoir, which was filled up to the rim when we checked it today. But though there's water everywhere, in Progresso, there's not a drop coming out of these pipes. In fact, there hasn't been any water here for three weeks and the roughly 700 residents who depend on the system have just about had enough.
Villager #1,
"None of us have water. We have to go get water at the well. We have to go beg the people who have well water and we have to go to the lagoon go bathe."
Jules Vasquez,
How the well water stand?
Villager #1,
"Well the board water is doing a lot of damage to the pickney because you have a lot of pickney who have loose stool and vomiting."
Villager #2,
"Its very hard here that we don't have no water because for wash we have to go the neighbor, to bathe the people they have to go to the lagoon go bathe and the water is very necessary for all of us here in the village."
Villager #3,
"Its hard for we here because to wash and drink we have to go haul water far like 2 to 3 lanes to get water and sometimes the well dry and the people tell us they can't give us water, we have to wait until the water come in. So we want this government let the water come in because we are paying our bill. They have some who pay their bill and they have some who aren't paying and because of one all of us get the pressure. So we would want they put the water back in Progresso because we have 1,2,3,4 kids right now. 4 kids and it is hard to get a lot of water right now to bathe and so."
Villager #4,
"This is a rough time because then we have to the hustle and when we go to the well it gives the baby them itch. We have to bring them to the lagoon come bathe and sometimes when you go, you have like scabies and things on their skin and then you have to find out how to get water and it is a hard time trying to get water. We have to boil the water because it gives the babies diarrhea and vomiting so we have to know how we will do it because we don't have nowhere else to get the water."
Villager #5,
"The problem is that they cut the water and I don't know why. I heard the pump broke and its been three weeks that we don't have water. Its impossible to die of thirst and not bathe. They are necessary things so what we did was cleaned our well because we had stopped using the well water."
Villager #6,
"It's a little hard to live without the water because that is very important so to cook we use the big gallon bottle of water and to bathe we pump water from the well."
Into the
well, that's' where residents have been going. These deep reservoirs, some of them long abandoned are now being cleaned up. Today they could be seen in the streets, very young and not so old, making their way around the streets
with water buckets scooped out of the wells of kind and friendly neighbors. Clementina Lino is one such person, she sunk her bucket into the well for us and have me a taste. Its water she drinks everyday but it wasn't quite for me.
Clementina Lino,
"After the water from the pipe was cut, the people started to look for places where there were wells to get water to drink., bathe, and wash so we decided to clean this one and now several people came to get water. No I don't charge people for the water because naturally God gave us the water, why must we charge for it. It's a blessing."
Drinking from wells and bathing in the Progresso Lagoon. The way these young children do it for their morning bath, it looks like a party but its not all that nice either.
Villager #4,
"All of us have to bathe in the lagoon and you itch and thing so we hurry go send water and we rinse off."
Jules Vasquez,
So you have to bathe here and go rinse home?
Villager #4,
"Yes and soapy ourselves good because it gives you an itch and thing."
So in this village everyone even the dogs are getting by without running water but getting by does not mean living well and the man at the center of the fury is Chairman Leonel Mendez.
Jules Vasquez,
700 people who've had the great inconvenience for the past 3 weeks. Whose to blame?
Leonel Mendez,
"Well in this kind of problems that we are facing in the village, they will always blame the Chairman and the water board and what's not."
Jules Vasquez,
Ultimately as the Chairman you have the great burden and responsibility of being responsible for the well being of the citizens of your village, Progresso Village, have you failed?
Leonel Mendez,
"I think I haven't and I will never fail to do the best for the community and when it comes to things like water which are very essential things for the community and the public, even myself when I reached from the bush that night I couldn't have a good bath because there was no water and I really need the water also so I am working very hard to get this through but as you may know, when you don't have the money in your hand to do as you would like to do it, its not so easy."
The solution to everything is a new pump which will go in this room outside of the village. Its village property but run by BWSL which Chairman Mendez says is at the heart of this problem, an unfair and disadvantageous agreement which should be noted he signed unto.
Leonel Mendez,
"There's a bill sent to us by BWSL for $1,460 every month. That goes to our account so automatically Progresso Water Board or customers are owing to BWSL about $18,000 to $20,000. the water system is like having two owners and one horse and that cannot be so we need to put this clear who will be the owner. Is it going to go to BWSL, its okay, let him be the sole owner. Is it going to be the villagers, let it be the villagers. That is what we are going to discuss on Thursday and at the end of the day they are saying to us you have to buy everything and they are the ones collecting where the money is going. That is unfair."
Unfair or not, that's what it is now and the village council and the Ministry of Local Government has to find the money for the pump.
Leonel Mendez,
"We have ordered one through Benny's and Thursday last week we ordered the new pump with exact specifications and hopefully, hopefully, anytime this week we are supposed to have the pump."
Jules Vasquez,
How much will it cost?
Leonel Mendez,
"At the moment we are waiting for Benny's to give us the exact figure what it is going to cost so that we can give them the...but I think that was done yesterday."
Jules Vasquez,
Leonel how it sounds to me, you all won't have water anytime soon because its on order and you don't know the amount, it doesn't sound like...its been 3 weeks now, it might be another little while.
Leonel Mendez,
"The pump should not be more than a $1,000 but that should be the cost of it but I don't have the figure to tell you exactly."
And until that order comes through, these villagers in the middle of a veritable water paradise will continue to have to do without running water.
The Progresso water system is one of the few co-managed rudimentary water systems in the country. Water users pay a flat rate of $10 a month. $7 of that goes to BWSL and $3 goes to the village council. Presently there are 140 subscribers, and in an average month, just over 100 users pay.
7NEWS produced for broadcast by News Director Jules Vasquez
Edited for the internet by Keith Swift
