The Prime Minister of Dominica Roosevelt Skerrit broke down in tears Thursday as he shared with the world the extent of the devastation caused by Hurricane Maria.
In an interview with state-owned ABS Television in Antigua, Skerrit fought to hold back the tears as he told the world that many residents do not have a place to sleep at night.
Skerrit, who travelled via helicopter to St. John’s to give his first interview since the island was hit on Monday night, also revealed that more than 30 people died and this number is expected to rise.
“Our main preoccupation now is search and rescue, to determine how many are dead, how many are missing, who we need to rescue, providing relief to many parts of the country,” he said.
“We do not have the total count because we have not been to some communities. So far, we would have buried in excess of 15 people. In one village, there are 13 people missing, in another village five people are missing, another community two and we can say they are [dead] because their homes are no longer standing. They’ve been washed away by the rivers.
“We have not been to many villages but just looking by air at the situation, if there are no fatalities then it’s a miracle . . . especially in the Kalinago villages where the indigenous people reside . . . it would be a total miracle if there are no fatalities in those villages. People were just exposed to the hurricane, nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. We have many deaths but it’s just a miracle that we do not have hundreds of deaths,” he added.
Skerrit said the road to recovery will be a long one for Dominica which was still trying to bounce back from Tropical Storm Erika which devastated the island in late 2015.
“The country was devastated. Every village in Dominica, every street, every cranny, every person in Dominica was impacted by the hurricane,” the Prime Minister said.
“We have no running water, we have no electricity, we have very limited telecommunication services by WhatsApp,” he said, adding that both Digicel and Flow have been working feverishly to restore services as there is limited cellular coverage.
“Many of our schools have been destroyed. Our main hospital is with no electricity now. We will have to access many villages by sea and by helicopter. It has been brutal. We have never seen such destruction. Unprecedented,” he said.
“It will take us a very long time to get back to pre-Maria state Every part of the country, either 95 percent, or 99 percent or 85 percent, everywhere in Dominica has received a serious beating. If it was not by the wind it was by river coming to your homes and by siltation . . . there were no classes as far as the hurricane was concerned,” the Dominica leader said.
“We are going to need a lot of helicopter services to airlift supplies to the respective communities. Eastern and southern communities have been completely cut off.
The Prime Minister said he will be travelling to New York on Friday to address the United Nations General Assembly.
“I originally had no intentions of going …. But I will speak to the international community, to have meetings with UN Secretary-General, to outline Dominica’s situation. So, we will not leave any stone unturned. We have all been impacted and we can only make life better.”
“The hospital is being run on an archaic system . . . the dialysis machines are down; the ICU has been destroyed by the hurricane. That is one of our major concerns. Any country that can assist us with airlifting patients to Martinique. One patient who has to receive dialysis every day walked over 21 miles and I met him at the hospital . . . another patient, if he doesn’t get airlifted, he will expire.”
“We have been playing our part but the extent of the resources required to put in the mitigation systems is beyond us…”
In a message to Dominicans in the Diaspora, Skerrit said the country needs them.
“If there has ever been a time that Dominica needed its people the most, it is now . . . I am here to speak on behalf of the 72,000 people who call Dominica home – every one of us needs you.”
