Minister of Social Affairs Appreciates the Action of Tagana and KSB to Clean Citonjong River

PANGANDARAN (24 November 2019) - The Minister of Social Affairs, Juliari P. Batubara, appreciates the action of Tagana Pangandaran Regency and the volunteers of the Disaster Alert Village (KSB), as well as the people of Bojong Village, Parigi District who carried out a clean movement of the Citonjong River, Sunday (24/11).

"Amazing Pangandaran friends, bravo!" Minister of Social Affairs Ari wrote through the Disaster Preparedness Village social media group, shortly after learning that several photos of Tagana's action of cleaning the Citonjong River were uploaded.

River cleaning activities are one of the routine activities carried out as a mitigation effort before the rainy season arrives.

"We have the Tagana Guarding Nature (TMA) program as one of the disaster mitigation efforts. Today, together with KSB and the community clean the Citonjong River," said the Head of the Tagana Communication Forum Pangandaran Regency Nana Suryana, who is fondly called Nay.

According to Nay, the Citonjong River is a source of livelihood for the local community, but is one of the rivers that is prone to flooding every year. "There have been flash floods here several times. Last year alone, the overflow of the Citonjong River inundated hundreds of houses which caused us to evacuate several residents who lived along the riverbank area at that time," he said.

There are many factors, he said, including the narrowing of the river body, plus the large amount of waste blocking the flow of the river. Therefore, the community needs to be constantly reminded of the importance of protecting the surrounding environment.

"The awareness of residents not to littering carelessly must be reminded, especially since the Citonjong River is a river flow from the Citumang tourism area which provides a lot of income for the community, so it must be preserved," said Nay.

He continued, in addition to cleaning the river, the main goal of TMA activities is to socialize the community to take part in protecting nature. "We educate the public with real action. If we just pick up trash, we will get tired ourselves. The most important thing is to build awareness," he said.

Nay added, previously, the same movement had been carried out in Pangandaran Beach and Cikidang River. "We still do beach cleaning routinely, the last thing we are doing is jointly with the Regent and the community to clean the Cikidang river," he explained.

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the KSB Bojong Village, Saprudin, said that his party is very enthusiastic about carrying out the river clean movement. "We are very motivated after receiving directions from Tagana. This is like getting new energy because we have to protect this river together," he said.

He hopes that after this movement, the community will be more aware of protecting the river. "Hopefully this will become a big movement, in which not only us but also the whole community will no longer throw garbage into the river and keep the riverbanks awake," he concluded.