The Port Vila Municipal Council has been ordered to address the leakage of sewage water into the harbour in Vanuatu’s capital city.
A Wastewater Taskforce conducted an inspection and identified that the recreational toilets located at the Seafront playground and Handicraft market have been leaking direct effluent discharge of sewage water into the coastal harbour.
The Department of Water Resources (DoWR) issued a Direction notice to the municipal council for polluting the harbour as based on the inspection report.
Directly polluting any water resources falls under the Water Resources Management Act [281] giving the Director of Water Resources the power and responsibility to penalize anyone who commits an offence regarding water pollution.
The Director of the DoWR, Erickson Sammy said, “PVMC has been issued a period of two weeks to meet the conditions of the Direction notice or will be issued a Penalty notice or face prosecution.
“We would like to assure the public that for the purposes of restoring our beautiful harbor, this is not the only notice that will be served. Other organizations and government departments directly polluting the harbor will also be expecting Direction notices or Penalty notices in the coming weeks”, he said.
Port Vila Town Clerk , Peter Sakita confirmed work is being done to address the leakage.
“The leakage is due to a technical problem with the pump inside the treatment plant and we are working with Switch On electrical company to fix the treatment plant.
Mr. Sakita confirmed that currently only one toilet at Sea front Park is available for public use, while work is being done on the treatment plant.
Photo supplied Caption: DoWR officers conducting a water test in Port Vila Harbour