| WHICH MINISTER OF ENERGY IS TO BE FIRED NEXT? NAWEC has been undergoing many problems these days. Up country the president keeps on promising that the current outages in the provision of electricity is associated with the first phase of development of rural electrification, that the second phase would put the problem behind the Nation. Advertisement: What is however difficult to understand is the cause of the permanent power outages in the urban area despite the numerous promises that they would be a thing of the past. Readers would recall the festive atmosphere which accompanied the transportation of a number of generators from the ports. Today the urban area is not only experiencing periodic load shedding which comes at regular intervals, it is also experiencing haphazard power outages which is destroying a lot of equipment. The Public Utility Regulatory Authority is established to ensure accessibility to and affordability of public services. This is the body that should be left to serve as an oversight institution which should be telling Gambians on a regular basis what is being done to overcome uncertainty and unpredictability in the provision of public services. Foroyaa thought that once the power outages started NAWEC would be calling on the Authority to give it regular feedback on what is going on for onward transmission to the consumers. Instead we have witnessed the removal of Mrs Sira Wally Ndow as Minister of Energy and the appointment of Mr Ousman Jammeh. He is also removed and the portfolio has gone back to the President. Obviously services have not improved. Firing of the Ministers is therefore not the solution. What is needed is to get PURA fully involved in determining what is wrong and fully inform the public. Some years ago Gambian elites were made to believe that the use of generators would be a thing of the past. Now the hiring of generators is becoming a profitable service. This however will reflect on the cost of goods and services sold to the consumers. Foroyaa will contact PURA for more explanation. |
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