The risk of severe flooding in the Nawaka area towards Nadi town is expected to drop in the upcoming cyclone season.

This comes as desilting works at the Nawaka dams are currently underway to ease water flow in the Nawaka River and its adjacent creeks in times of heavy rain.

Waterways Minister, Doctor Mahendra Reddy says failure to clear waterways and dams from silt and debris can create widespread chaos during the rainy season.

“So retention dams have helped us a lot, apart from dredging downstream to minimize flooding in Nadi town. And I want to thank the members of the Nawaka community and also communities upstream for allowing us to construct the dam.”

Doctor Reddy adds with two weeks away from the cyclone season, the Ministry is working closely with relevant authorities to ensure development projects to mitigate flooding are executed at the earliest.

“The dams are now filled with silt materials. We need to remove it so that the volume of that dam is there to retain water and we need to rush to do that because we are approaching the rainy season and we don’t want Nadi town to be flooded.”

One-thousand meters of river desilting works will be undertaken at the two dams under the Public-Private Partnership agreement with Selva Earth Works and Nagaga Trust.