Disaster team face transport problem to deliver tanks

THE Southern Highlands Emergency and Disaster Centre is facing transportation difficulties to supply water tanks to areas affected by last year’s earthquake as previous service providers have yet to get paid.
The National Emergency and Disaster Centre recently supplied the tanks to the province. Controller Dr Bill Hamblin confirmed the supplies were presented in Mendi.
Provincial deputy administrator Fiebik Kilip said some had been distributed but lack of transportation means was a major setback to delivery.
He said many service providers were not paid yet and they could not help the team.
“In the middle of last year the National Emergency and Disaster Centre gave the provincial government K1 million which was used to offload some of the bills of the service providers and there were still others who were not paid, especially in the districts,” Kilip told The National.
He said this was a huge setback for the team to give out the tanks to the affected villages, especially the people of Bosave and Kutubu in the Nipa-Kutubu district.
“We would like to apologise to the affected people at Pimaga, they were badly affected, we will make sure to prioritise them in the next round as currently we’re a bit handicapped.”