25.04.2010.

President Tadic visited the flooded areas

Serbian President Boris Tadic, accompanied by Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Ivica Dacic, Minister of Labour and Social Policy Rasim Ljajic and the Serbian Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Miloje Miletic, has visited today the flooded areas in Leskovac and Aleksinac.

In Leskovac settlement of Bobiste, President Tadic expressed his indignation because the floods are a result of, as he said, “carelessness, negligence, responsibility and the fact that the channels have not been cleaned in the last five decades.” The villagers said that the untreated channel was built back in 1957, and that in the last five years, this has been the third major flood in the Leskovac region.

“The state must be present where it is difficult to help, to show its organization and strength. For emergency assistance the Government approved funding and the financial and material assistance has already been directed to the citizens, but it is necessary to make steps towards systemic solutions in order to minimize the risk of spillage of rivers and channels”, "Tadic said.

The residents of the settlement of Bobiste in Leskovac, in their talks with President Boris Tadic, stated that with all the hassle that happened to them they have also the words of praise for the members of the Armed Forces and the Ministry of Interior. “If they were not here, we would still be swimming in the water,” emphasized the locals.

In the settlement of Bobiste about 800 houses are flooded, due to spill over of large amounts of ground water and torrent streams. At the invitation of the Crisis Staff, officers and soldiers of the Seventh Training Centre in Leskovac immediately responded. According to Lieutenant Commander Mijodrag Djurovic, they have been engaged in supplying the citizens with drinking water for three days already, and the soldiers with Sergeant Major Sasa Todorovic have been constantly working on pumping out of water in the settlement of Bobiste, removing 800 litres of water per minute.

President Boris Tadic visited the flooded area near the village of Vitkovac in Aleksinac municipality. That part engaged 60 soldiers, two pumps, two tanks and two engineering machines from the composition of the Third Army Brigade.

Tadic expressed his gratitude to members of the military, police and firefighters for the assistance they provided to the population affected by floods being at their service “day and night”. He said the embankment in the village of Vitkovac must be built and announced that in the years to come the water infrastructure projects, along with those in road traffic, will have priority.

The Serbian Government decided yesterday to provide the financial assistance of 39 million dinars to towns and municipalities affected by floods. According to the Government's decision, Zajecar will receive financial assistance of 12 million dinars, Leskovac 13 million and Aleksinac seven million dinars. For Prokuplje the Serbian Government has allocated three million dinars of aid, for Kraljevo – two million, while Krusevac and Gadzin Han received million dinars each.

The Serbian Government made the decision about this first financial aid, as stated, with a goal to help families whose buildings suffered the highest damage and mitigate the consequences resulting from the recent floods.