Impact of the natural disaster is being assessed in Khashuri municipality
Lado Bitchashvili, Shida Kartli
The water-flood of June 10 caused 10 million GEL damage in Surami, Khashuri municipality. Heavy rain moved silt and ruins from the mountains, which filled the river bed and the flooded water flew into the basements, cellars and agricultural plots of the locals.
Surami residents had petitioned to the Khashuri municipality administration with the request to reinforce the river bed and to clean the channel several times but all in vain.
“When you ignore the petitions of the local population with regard to expected threats, it is crime. The person, who urged the local authority to clean the channel, now is left without home. It is not right to blame the natural disaster in everything, when relevant preventive measures could mitigate the risks and loss,” Surami resident Ramaz Nozadze said.
Khashuri municipality governor said even if they had cleaned the channels, it could not reduce the damage because the river bed and channels were damaged by the torrent.
“There have been heavy rains for the past few months and intensive rains brought silt and ruins from the mountains, which blocked the river. It would be better if we had enough resources in our budget every year to clean the river bed; two years ago, 9 000 GEL was spent on it but this time it was natural disaster, which we could not avoid and reduce the impact,” the governor said.
The Government of Georgia allocated million GEL to eradicate the damage of the infrastructure. As for the loss of the locals, the commission is studying their cases.