 I wish to welcome you all on this auspicious occasion, the completion of the Denry North Water Supply Project. I assumed the post of head of project management unit of the project management unit back in 2016 as a non-national, which you can probably guess by now by my accent. I was not familiar with the circumstances surrounding the water supply to the Denry North area and some of the hardships that were experienced by the residents of this community over the years. However, I quickly came to understand the situation when we got involved in trying to implement this project and indeed some of the issues that were involved. Indeed, I was welcomed, okay, by residents of this community, and let me explain what that means in the sense that we had a number of community meetings where we sought to explain the issues around the project and what was going to happen over the period of construction and so on. Those welcomes were indeed warm ones because the residents in no uncertain terms made it known to us, you know, the difficulties they had experienced. We had two meetings in particular, one in Denry River and the other one in Olio, where the residents turned out in their numbers to hear what was happening about the project and indeed what was happening from Wasco. So I indeed remember those occasions very well. So I'm indeed very grateful to be part of this journey with you. It's really been, I think I was usually with a blessing that we can arrive at this day where we, because we appreciate, you know, the, as I said, the difficulties which experienced by the community over many decades of what I was made to understand. So I am grateful to be part of that journey, to be part of the process in terms of providing a better water supply to you. So it gives me great pleasure to stand before you and welcome you all, our specially invited guests, but really thanking and welcoming the community to be part of the occasion this afternoon because this is for you, this is really your project and our delivering a far better water supply to you than you had before. So may the ties between Wasco and the community of Denry North be deepened by this project. Ties that bind are not disconnect us. While there may be issues from time to time, let us go forward in partnership to cement the relationship that we have and not to go back to the difficult days of the past. I thank you very much. We are gathered here today to commemorate the completion of phase two of the Denry North water supply project in particular and the overall completion of the project in general. What began with a project study and planning has now, has now at last come to full realization in the year 2020. You will recall that we started phase one of this project on January the 3rd, 2017. This part of the project which cost $6.6 million was completed 12 months later. The Thomas O treatment plant and the existing facilities were handed over to Wasco on January the 15th, 2018. On March the 5th, 2018 the plant at Thomas O was formally commissioned and opened by the Mexican government, the government of St. Lucia and Unops. Phase one of the project encompassed the following. One, the construction of a raw water intake on the Thomas O River capable of extracting sufficient quantities of raw water to meet the demands of residents. Two, the installation of transmission facilities from the intake to the treatment plant capable of distributing 500,000 gallons of water per day. And thirdly, the installation of portable transmission and distribution facilities inclusive of pump stations to the existing Thomas O tank and Denry North distribution area to include a transmission main from the treatment plant to the Alba Bridge and the transmission main to Mon Panache Pumping Station. After phase one the residents of the area will receive in about 500,000 imperial gallons of good quality treated portable water per day albeit at the lower elevations. For this we must commend the contractors, board of directors of OASCO, the management and staff of OASCO being the executive agency on behalf of CDB, the present government of St. Lucia which provided advanced funding of 1.6 million US dollars along with the Mexican government that provided grant funding to the tune of 5 million US dollars. This grant was previously procured from the Mexican government by the former administration. UNOPS United Nations Office of Project Services was the consultant engineers for phase one of the project and handled the procurement aspect which led to the phase of the project being contracted to Vinci in a joint venture with CIE. On January the 15th 2019 we embarked on phase two of this project which comprised the following components one upgrade of the treatment plant to 1.5 million gallons of water per day. Secondly the laying of 12 kilometers of HDP pipe ranging from a hundred to 150 millimeters diameter for treated water transmission and distribution along the highway and in the large Larisos Mon Panache and Oleo communities. Phase two was formally handed over to OASCO on the 18th of February 2020. Phase two brought relief to other communities of denry north such as Belmont, Denier river and Oleo. Phase two of this project have ensured that the water is provided at higher elevations through the installation of booster pumping stations in specific areas and through the provision of three phase electricity in areas like Mon Panache, Oleo, Gadette and Denier river. There are added water tank storage facilities in these areas and an increase of an additional one million gallons of water throughout the communities. At this juncture all of denry north is in receipt of water via the various infrastructure facilities that have been built. You will recall the serious drought conditions the country faced earlier this year and denry north like other parts of the country was affected by the lack of rainfall and consequent low river flows. The infrastructure however allowed OASCO to reach all over the community albeit on a scheduled basis. Without it in place the situation would have been much worse. This phase of the project costs approximately US 8.6 million dollars which was funded by a loan from the CDB. The approved contractor for the project will vince construction ground projects who completed the work within budget. The main contractor utilized several smaller contractors from denry north for support works which brought added financial gain and the employment of over 105 locals in the community. The people of denry north are finally enjoying a remarkable and sustainable supply of good quality treated potable water after decades of receiving turbid water through debt apps specifically during ready months when the abstraction points are heavily silted. For this we must commend the board of directors of OASCO the management and staff of OASCO and the CDB which provided funding. The CDB played a key role in providing source funding for the denry north water supply system. The government of St Lucia requested assistance from CDB for financing the project and the bank approved a loan of 11.2 million US dollars to the government of St Lucia for improving the supply of water to the residents of denry north. We must thank the bank that has supported OASCO with its various water supply projects over many years. From all indications residents in denry north are satisfied and elated with the drastic improvement in the production of the water supply. We thank them for bearing with us over the years and throughout the construction period as we transition from the old to the new. In 2018 OASCO generously waived an amount of over three million dollars for residents who had accumulated substantial arrears on account of the inadequacy and poor quality of service which was rendered to them by OASCO over the past decades. With the culmination of the project we look forward to denry north residents now coming fully on board to support OASCO with the payments of their rates so that we can continue to provide an adequate water supply to them in the years ahead. Make sense of course. We wish to extend our thanks to the Honorable Sean Edward, parliamentary representative for denry north. For the assistance he provided OASCO during side visits and Tom Hall meetings we had if residents of the community. In effect the construction of the project facilities started under the watch of the present management and staff and board of directors from start to finish. At this point we would like to thank all the parties associated with OASCO, specifically Vinci Construction, Unops, Mr Adrian Thebles of Thebles Consulting who are the consultants for phase two. The OASCO project management unit headed by Mr Gordon White and his capable staff. The government of St. Lucia, the Mexican government, our Prime Minister, Hon. Alan Michael Chastney and his cabinet of ministers and our very own line minister Hon. Ezekiel Joseph for his advice and close support for this project. Ladies and gentlemen I thank you for coming to partake in this activity. May the Good Lord guide and protect us in this journey to ensure our people in denry north are provided if an improved water production and distribution service by the new OASCO team. And I must add professionally qualified OASCO team. What is life? I thank all of you for coming. They're members of the community of Dennery North. It is an honor for me as ambassador of Mexico to participate in the official handover ceremony of the Dennery North Water Project. Mexicans and Lucia share more than a geographic and cultural belonging to the Caribbean region. We are reliable partners and close friends who extend side-by-side to work either on bilateral projects or coordinate in international organizations to promote our shared values such as democracy, sustainable development and the promotion of regional integration. Like real friends do, we help each other to accomplish task-person the welfare of our citizens. Thus Mexico and San Lucia agreed to develop a large-scale infrastructure project. The construction of an integral and sustainable drinking water solution in Dennery North. And our government contributed with five million US dollars for the construction of the first stage of this project which was handed over in March 2018. And today we are very satisfied and happy to bear witness to the completion and handing over of this very important project which will ensure the quality and its supply of the water in the Mabuya Valley whose residents have had long lacked reliable and high quality water system. I just want to highlight the fact that prior to this water system, Mexico has worked with San Lucia in other infrastructure projects such as the construction of the ambulance, security and more components of the San Jude Hospital. And together with the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, Mexico took part in initiatives to build two green houses to train local farmers and students. But the cooperation between our two countries expands beyond infrastructure development. We also participate in capacity building efforts and other kind of assistance. And in terms of resilience, we are interested in cooperating with Caribbean countries to increase their and our environmental resilience as we share this with these countries common difficulties and challenges related with climate change. During last year, the field of cooperation has been enhanced with very important new projects for San Lucia such as the heritage management, conservation and protection and the preservation and management of beaches and protection of coastal biodiversity. At the same time, during this past year, Mexico has offered training programs to the San Lucia government in a variety of additional specialties. In addition to the field of cooperation, we seek to continue expanding also our political relations and collaboration and coordination in regional and international forums that address issues concerning both countries and the Eastern Caribbean region in general. We are very grateful for the support and enthusiastic accompaniment of the government of San Lucia to the initiatives and projects promoted by Mexico within the framework of the CELAC this year that my country is chairing the Pro Temporary Secretariat. This year, Mexico is also looking for the support of these candidacies to the World Trade Organization, the International Criminal Court and the Committee for the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women, among others. Ladies and gentlemen, I am confident that this project will help to alleviate the war resolution in Dernary North and will improve the lives of the people of San Lucia. Ladies and gentlemen, I say hello to the community in Mabuya. I say hello to the people of San Lucia. I wish everyone good health and happiness. Thank you very much. On behalf of the Vinci team, I would like to thank the people of the Valley and of Dernary North for their patience and cooperation which allow us to do work during these last two years. We apologize for the inconvenience caused during the works but we hope that the improved water services will be by far surpassed the discomfort experienced during this period. We are still present in the area during final touch-up and manner repairs in coordination with the WASCO team and we want to make sure that the distribution system will be strong resilient and sustainable before wrapping up in Dernary. We hope that this project will substantially improve the living condition of the residents of Dernary and that it will trigger further economic development in the area. We would also like to thank the project team, WASCO, and Tiobal Consulting without whom the work could not have been done and completed on time and on budget. The success of a project, yeah you can, bigger. The success of a project really resided in the good understanding and working relationship between the client, in this case WASCO, the consultant engineer Tiobal, and the contractor Vinci. And I think that the Dernary Water Supply Project was a very good example of efficient collaboration and good team spirit. I would like also to thank the government of St. Lucia including the local government agencies for supporting and promoting this important project and for making it real from the inception designed to the commissioning of the full water system. We also thank our subcontractors, suppliers, and local stakeholders for their contribution to this project. Finally, we thank the government and WASCO for their continued trust and confidence in Vinci as we aspire to develop long lasting relationship with our clients and partners. Vinci took pride in executing a project from start to finish and we are happy to see the physical result of such project. So I would conclude on the Vinci Construction Adage, which is we build on trust. And I thank you very much and have a nice day. Today's ceremony marks a very joyous occasion for the people of Dernary North. It is a long-awaited dream and today a problem that has spanned decades has been solved. Historically, this problem has manifested itself in many different ways. Those of us who are old enough will recall in the 1970s and 80s, the valley had a serious problem with water born diseases. But the one that really put us on the back foot was Bilazia. And during the late 70s into the early 80s, Bilazia wrecked havoc. It contributed to the valley and the Dernary Basin having the highest rate of infant mortality in the entire country as far as the various districts were concerned. Our babies were dying because they were exposed to contaminated water and water that was not fit for human consumption. Of course, the government of the day, working with PAHU, working with USAID, the Ministry of Health and other like agencies were able to get to the bottom of that problem. And I can recall very, very vividly. On mornings, those SUVs with the PAHU labels and the USAID labels driving through the community, and they used to hand us as children as toddlers, containers, the containers that resemble what you buy your margarine in the supermarket. And they were saying to us that instead of using the toilet, use those containers. And they would label whatever was deposited in the container, take them away for analysis, and that is one of the approaches they use that successfully led to that problem being eradicated. But as we moved from the early 80s to the mid 80s and the early 90s, we had another problem. Or should I say the water problem manifested itself in a different way. And this time, it coincided with the period of Green Ghoul when banana was king. Every square foot of land that was available was being turned into a banana plot. And so people went into the forest reserve and they cut down sections of the forest to grow bananas. And it resulted in the watershed being compromised. And that resulted in the problem manifesting itself again. This time, in the form of insufficient supplying and also a quality issue. People were cultivating lands above catchments. It resulted in the infiltration of agrochemicals in the waterways. And a lot of persons who were getting sick, the supply was not sufficient and so we had a major water problem on our hands in the valley again. There were families in this valley that went for weeks, for days, for months, and yes, believe it, there are households in this Mabuya Valley that went for years without having a single drop of pipe-borne water coming through the lines. People had to stay up late at night. And if the family had five, they would take turns during the week, taking turns to decide who would stay up on a Monday night, who would stay up on a Tuesday night, Wednesday night and so on, to catch some water when the pressure built up sufficiently in the lines to reach the elevated communities. I remember several times driving through the community. And when children are supposed to be in school, you find them on their way home. And you would stop and ask, but why are you going home at this time of day? And they would tell you the teacher or the principal, they have centers home because there's no water at the school. And as a result, we were losing a lot of instruction time. We all can recall the pick-up vans with the drums and other water containers going to neighboring communities like Dennery South so that people can get some water. The turbidity of which the chairman of Vasco spoke earlier on was a serious problem. You actually had mud coming through some of the taps in some of the communities. And it resulted in washing machines and other appliances being damaged. There were several proposals over the years because the problem had been recognized from early. And this is a problem that predated my entry into politics long before I even offered myself to be a parliamentary, the problem existed. And there were several attempts to ameliorate that problem, who buy problems into a large amount. The French government at one time was working with the government of the day that did not bear fruit. In their own small way, the St. Louis Social Development Fund, which most of us refer to as the SSDF, they went about distributing water tanks, particularly to people in the elevated communities. And that was their contribution to helping give a little relief to the people. Through Jeff, IWCAM, there was a rain water harvesting program, again to provide relief and to compensate for the shortfall that was coming through the lines. And in 2006, it was Osbert Dauvin who created this entity in the Mabuya Valley known as the MDI, the Mabuya Valley or the Mabuya Development Institute. And he prepared a proposal for submission to the EU. But Dauvin had his problem with the administration of the day that failed and the project did not get started. And so in 2012, in Guatemala, Central America, at an OAS meeting, the current member of Parliament for Library and former external affairs minister for St. Lucia, Alva Baptiste, engaged the foreign affairs minister of Mexico, asking for assistance for this project. And the Mexicans agreed that they were going to give us five million U.S. dollars, which translate into EC to roughly 13 million EC dollars. That is where we got the grant funding from, for phase one of the project. I can recall in a voice newspaper the weekend issue of 5th June 2010. The headline for the paper on that particular weekend was, and I quote, Government Blocks Project. And it basically referenced the article that is irate constituents or members of the country north go into the newspaper to express their grievances, because as I said, the proposal that had been prepared by Mr. Dauvin did not get favor with the administration of the day, and so they saw that as a major, major setback. In 2015, a loan application was made to the Caribbean Development Bank, and I can recall being in the cabinet room on a Monday morning, and Dr. Jimmy Fletcher who sits, or who sat rather, two chairs to my left in the cabinet room, he tapped me on the shoulder to tell me he had just received a message, because at the time Dr. Fletcher, by virtue of being Minister for Sustainable Development, he had lined ministerial responsibility for water resources, and he said to me that he had just received a message from his PS that the CDB had approved the loan application from the government to fund the denry of Watery Development Project Phase 2 to the tune of $22 million. That figure I think had been reviewed by the incoming government, and you would have heard right here in this church here the line minister, sometime last year I think it was, alluding to the fact that they had to delay the project, review the loan application, and so they ended up with a different figure. But I was very elated in 2015 when the CDB said categorically to us, yes, that the loan application had been approved, and that we would have had sufficient money to add to what Mexico had given to ensure the successful completion of the Denry of Watery Development Project. Today, as we speak, every single community of the valley is benefiting from this new project. We would have recalled, but as we speak today, all receiving water, including Montego Bay from this new water project. There's been also receiving water from this new facility. And LAPEL, GADET, and APATAT are also benefiting from this particular project. It is my responsibility this afternoon as a parliamentary rep to place on record my gratitude to thank everyone, and to the agency, to the group, who made a contribution to what I am saying today, to the GGLU that I have been doing, and to the valley that I have been going to to do, to do, to do, to do in Cairo. I must thank the people of Denry North for their patience. Sometimes you conceive of projects in government, and these projects end up having what we call an extremely long gestation period. And everybody who has served in a government at the level of cabinet at least. You would go to cabinet on certain days, and you would plan a particular project. It will be conceived, you will make the allocations, and you expect it to finish by a particular date. But sometimes the date by which the project is expected to be completed, it may not have even started. In the case of this project, we are late by a few years, and so I must thank the constituents of Denry North for your patience during that time. They say patience is a virtue, and today we are reaping the rewards of our patience. I must thank the former prime minister, Dr. Kenny D. Anthony, who gave me support when that project was being touted in our cabinet room, and when representation was being made by the President of Mexico for grant funding to get at least phase one going. I must thank my former cabinet colleague and Member of Parliament for Library, the Honorable Alva Baptiste, for his role in that project. Dr. James Fletcher, who led the Ministry of Sustainable Development that had responsibility, line responsibility for water resources, has to be thanked for the role that the agencies under his watch played in ensuring that this project is a success today. I wish I could have thanked the Mexican ambassador in Spanish with the eloquence that he spoke Creole, but I can't, and so I will stick to English and say to you, Ambassador, on behalf of the people of Denry North and by extension the people of St. Lucia, how grateful we are for your country's benevolence. And before Ambassador took his post in St. Lucia, he was preceded by another ambassador who carried this project very, very close to his heart, Ambassador Moreno. And I'm asking you today, Ambassador, to please convey our sentiments to Ambassador Moreno as well. Can we put our hands together for the people of Mexico for the assistance that they've given? There was a gentleman by the name of Jesus Zapata from the Mesoamerican Fund. They played a very, very vital role in ensuring that the monies were channeled properly to get that particular project going. We must thank the personnel of UNOPS, particularly Gibril Mazin, Mathur Beltran and staff for the role that they played in this project. And how can we forget Natalie and Jibo of UNOPS Haiti, who led the PR campaign in every pocket community to let people know that this project had to be appreciated for what it was. I must thank today the Prime Minister and the line minister for water resources, for allowing the project to go through stopping it when there was a change of administration. Mr. Dembo has to be commended, and I have made that point before. Sometimes as a parliamentary rep in opposition, you do not always get the courtesies of some agencies, but not for once has Wasco undertaken any work in this constituency for Mr. Dembo or at least somebody whom he delegates would contact me to keep me in the loop in terms of what is happening. I wish I could have said the same for some agencies, but unfortunately I can't. And for that, Mr. Dembo, I am extremely grateful and I wish you success in your future endeavours as the man who leads Wasco in the months or weeks to come. Once again, I just want to say how grateful I am as a parliamentary rep. All of us who have served in a cabinet, all of us who have been elected as parliamentary representatives, we embark to do a lot of things for our people. We all have been elected to parliament. We have always been encouraged to work by faith and community. But for now let us go and get help. Let us go to office and deliver in terms of what we call in English our quiet moments. There is always one or two projects that stand out. And for me I am extremely proud of the role and the advocacy that are initiated as it relates to the successful completion completion of this project. Today, the people of the valley are the winners. We deserve it. We deserve that and we deserve more. I have said in the parliament and I have said elsewhere, in the heady of the banana industry, let's think to come in, come in $100 million into a piece of it. Thank you to all the people who have done this project. Thank you and thank you. Thank you and best wishes to everybody. Your parliamentary representative says he stands here as a proud individual and that's a project that's very close to his heart. And I have no problems with he expressing this. But I want to say I stand here as a proud minister responsible for our school. And the reason why I'm saying this is because during my journey as a staff member of the Mabia Valley Development Project and that's some years ago, it was in the 90s, Mr. Lynch, Collins Lynch, Chalic and myself on many occasions had reasons to visit where we constructed the pedam. And of course at that time the Mabia Valley Project was looking for resources to construct a dam and to improve the water system in the Mabia Valley. And as a community development officer at the time with the Mabia Valley Development Project it was my responsibility to engage the community and to of course engage the leadership and the government at the time to get the resources to improve the system. Unfortunately it did not materialize. Of course when we came back as the government in 2016 the Honorable Prime Minister not having the knowledge of my involvement as far as the situation of water in the Mabia Valley decided to give me the responsibility of our school. And I can say that I am happy that I was given that responsibility because today I'm completing a journey that was started many years ago. I want to recognize the parliamentary representative of course like he articulated during his time in government and it took the responsibility to get the resources but when we came in 2016 like he also said we had to review the project. And again he said but he didn't give you the figure that by reviewing phase two of the project we were able to cut costs and approach the Caribbean Development Bank to reduce the loan that was approved for this project. So we know when we were in the development bank but seeing it continue in the plan, in the development bank the guy spent a lot of money to spend actual money. And that is what you call prudent government. We reviewed the project and we saw there were places we could have undertaken cuts and we did it. And I remembered when the Honorable Prime Minister and myself discussed this project there were a number of things you're not happy with and likelihood from the chairman. When we engaged Mr. Timothy who came down from Jamaica we told him let me tell you whilst we have serious problems with the way the project is conceptualized where you only had one contractor, local contractor getting all the contracts my government said in phase two that cannot happen. And I can tell you that the contractor agreed and whilst we went ahead with phase one as is in phase two we said you have to cut the contract. And in fact all the contractors that will engage on phase two will from the Mabio Valley. I want to give Mabio Valley a round of applause. I want to say here and I'm agreeing with the parliamentary representative. When you're in cabinet you conceptualize projects you do the planning unlike was for this project it was conceptualized in 2015 and 2016 was elections. But now we're in 2020 and you're doing projects in 2020 but we hand its election projects. So some of the incorrect law or government law or government will conceptualize projects. Patutin Pojiaka implement manually implement. Not all the time you'll be able to implement the project on the other quick pace. So as a government so then we can tell naturally that in 2020 we're doing projects because projects need to be done. I am hearing sometimes we have a very vindictive government. We are government that is very vindictive. We are government that don't care about people. We are government that do not take care of constituencies that we are not represented by our parliamentarians. But here's a typical example in the Mabio Valley. The Mabio Valley is represented by Honorable Sean Edward and we never stopped the project. In fact my prime minister put more pressure on me to make sure that this project was implemented. He went to look for additional resources to complete phase one and Mr Dembo spoke about it of 1.6 million but he said Mr Minister we need to do that project for the people of the Mabio Valley. Now let's say Mr Prime Minister thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to deliver on a project that I started sometime in 1990 and I want to say Mr Parliamentary Representative thank you very much for at least getting the grand funding from the government of Mexico. I want to say that I'm happy with what we have been able to accomplish as a government and the leadership of Mr Dembo the board and management at Wasco because apart from what we are seeing here today let me the John come to them from 2010 that project has been an outstanding project under the leadership of Mr Alan Sharsley and the government of United Lucas party we are going to start this in the John come to them the view for the development project next week we'll be in view for to stand the sword for the view for redevelopment water project in Soufre we have improved the water system in Soufre we have improved the water system in canaries we have improved the water system in Suazel in Grozilet and of course in Babonu oh I didn't forget about Miku I didn't forget about Miku. Honorable Aston James had a project in Miku and we talked about victimization he started a project in Miku Honorable Aston James and why is it in opposition it never finished when we came back under my leadership and the parliamentary representative of you thought of Miku south we finish it so I want to say thank you very much the people of the Mabia Valley for your patience I want to say thank you very much to the parliamentary representative and of course to the government of Mexico and I want to recognize the effort of my board and management I'm happy to be part and parcel of this history in the Mabia Valley today thank you very much