KUCHING: What the residents of Kampung Sangai Empani need to do now in order to enjoy clean and uninterrupted water supply is to agree with the original feasibility study conducted by the authority concerned in early 2013.
This was pointed out by Assistant Public Health Minister Datuk Dr Jerip Susil yesterday, who said a solution to the problem is available and it is up to the villagers to help themselves by constructing the proposed new system on a ‘gotong royong’ basis.
He said the problem would not have occurred had they agreed with the recommendation based on the feasibility study carried out by Program Bekalan Air dan Sanitasi (Bakas) under Sarawak State Health Department in 2013.
“When Bakas Serian conducted the feasibility study for Kampung Sangai Empani water project they selected Sungai Sangai as the suitable water source as it is 68 feet high, which is a suitable height to generate enough water pressure to distribute to the whole village and it is 11,890 feet from the village.
“Based on the design, distance of water source to the village and the distance between the village and town area, the estimated project cost was worked out to be RM171,092,” Dr Jerip explained.
However, he said after Bakas consulted the kampung folks over the proposed project a quarter of them strongly opposed the choice of Sungai Sangai as the water source and proposed another river, Sungai Singok, instead.
Dr Jerip, who is Bengoh assemblyman, said due to the strong objection by several villagers to use Sungai Sangai as the source, Bakas Serian was obligated to follow the decision made by the community instead of using Sungai Sangai which was identified to be a more suitable and reliable water source.
He disclosed this in a statement made available to The Borneo Post yesterday to rebut and clarify on the water problem in Kampung Sangai Empani which the DAP had turned into an issue.
“The system using Sungai Singok was constructed and completed in November 2013 at a total cost of RM171,092. This system which supplied the whole village was provided with a filtration mechanism that improves water quality and safety while at the same time preventing blockages and simplifying maintenance at the source,” he said.
But due to high water usage by the villagers and the expected low water flow from Sungai Singok, the system was insufficient to continuously supply water which would become acute after three weeks of drought, he added.
He said this prompted the villagers to build a new dam on their own two months ago; based on their own design and using Sungai Sangai – the source originally recommended by Bakas Serian.
“However, the dam was constructed at a lower site than originally proposed by Bakas Serian. Thus the height was inadequate to generate adequate pressure to be able to supply water to the whole village.
“Besides, when the new system was constructed it was incomplete because the main pipe supply from the new dam stopped short at the village without individual connection to the houses.
“This prompted the former village water supply chairman Saimon Empalu to write to Serian District Health Office requesting assistance to connect their system to the existing Bakas-built mainline,” he disclosed.
However, Serian District Health Office disagreed as they did not want the unfiltered water from the incomplete new system to contaminate the filtered Bakas-built water supply system, Dr Jerip explained.
He added that the office also disagreed to connect the new and old systems as the water head at the newly built dam would still be insufficient to ensure adequate and continuous water supply pressure to the whole village, thus connecting it would not solve their water supply problem.
“In fact Serian Health District Office has discussed the matter with the headman and the village committee that the department intends to rebuild a new water supply based on the initial finding from the feasibility study in 2013.
“If they agree, the project can be implemented and completed within this year itself. So in fact a better solution is available but the only thing is the villagers have to agree and ready to participate through gotong-royong basis,” Dr Jerip stressed.