Economy, News

Gambia: Barrow Reiterates Commitment To Solve Power Shortage

(JollofNews) – President Adama Barrow of the Gambia Friday reiterated his government’s commitment to solve the country’s acute power shortage.

The Gambia is facing serious electricity and water shortages, which is crippling many small businesses and the local economy.

All conventional electricity is produced mainly by thermal generation, and by the National Water and Electricity Company (NAWEC), the sole distributor throughout the country. The main power station at Kotu (rated capacity 46 MW, actual capacity 25 MW), runs on heavy fuel oil (HFO).

The lack of a reliable household electricity supply for the majority of the population, which  NAWEC has attributed to the old generators, has led to the endemic use of traditional biomass fuels for household needs, especially in rural areas.

But speaking to reporters after visiting NAWEC’s main powerplant in Kotu, Mr Barrow said his government is concerned at the country’s electricity and water crisis.

“I think NAWEC has been a concern for me and my government. We decided to make a visit in order to ascertain what is going on” Mr Barrow said.

“The public is very concerned and we are also concerned and currently working on plans to solve the electricity problems within two to three years.”

Alieu Bah, a NAWEC officials who spoke to this reporter, said the company is working on major projects that would help to stabilise the power supply across the country.

“NAWEC has already signed a contract for the building of another powerplant. It will bring an additional capacity of 20 megawatt within 18 months. This is all going towards solving the electricity supply,” he said.

Apart from constructing new electricity plant, Mr Bah said the company has secured funding from the World Bank to rehabilitate the old generators they are currently using.

Dr. Muhamed Hakim, one of the engineers hired by NAWEC to build the new powerplant said the project is nearing completion.

He said with the building of 20 and 16 megawatts powerplants in Brikama, some 22 km away from the capital city Banjul, Gambia’s electricity situation will no longer be a nightmare in two-year time.

11 Comments

  1. It is high time Water and Electricity were separated….and given up to international tender. This would cost the consumer more in the short term as the investment goes in. But without adequate surplus power and water for industrial development, Gambia will fail in all it’s prime objectives. It is a measure of this government that it prefers to stall progress by putting it all off to three years in the future. By then nothing will have changed apart from applying sticky plaster on so many ageing and obsolete generators. It has been the case for 50 years…in three years the loans to make good existing stock will still need paid…and more sticky plaster will be procured.

  2. Another good photo opportunity from President Barrow….”

    Action man !!!!

  3. How can the electricity situation become satisfactory when this inept Barrow squandered our money on going to Mecca with a plane load of his family and surrogates, travel to New York with over 53 people to enable them receive fat per diem emoluments, travel to Dakar to visit Marabouts, ask his wife to spend the people’s money on a wedding trip to Dakar, make useless visits to Congo Brazzaville, France, Brussels, spend millions of dalasis at a hotel, spend millions of dalasis at a useless inauguration ceremony, spend millions of dalasis in refurbishing state houses at Fajara and Banjul and the unseen millions of dalasis he steals daily? How can our POOR enjoy the facilities electricity provides?
    Whilst he was busy wasting our money, didn’t he know that we have acute electricity shortages, portable water problems….? Or was he just interested in acquiring his mundane ambitions first and later look into our collective problems? What a corrupt, inept and USELESS “president”

    • Babu Soli, did you watch the NAWEC Management on Kerr Fatu Show? Some startling revelations about the corporation. Apparently, the “newest” generator in Kotu was installed in 1979. All the generators at Kotu have outlived their life spans and completely obsolete. Manufacturers have even stopped manufacturing the parts for some of the older ones, and when maintenance work is being carried out, as is the case currently, there are no standby generators which NAWEC can fall back on. Hence, the acute power shortages. According to the water department spokesperson, no major water projects have been carried out in The Gambia since the days of “Sunu Mam Ye” (our grandfathers-Wollof). No wonder water is in short supply.
      But guess what! This “inept” administration has already obtained a brand new generator with help from the World Bank, which is currently being installed at Kotu. Another one has been ordered and is being manufactured, whilst contracts are being negotiated for the purchase of another brand new generator.
      The transmission and distribution system will also be upgraded to maximise the new capacity (to be generated by these Brand New Generators), as currently, up to 20% of power generated is lost through transmission.
      Already, the SENELEC contract is having a positive effect on communities that are benefitting, such as Farafenni Town, where residents have been quoted as saying that they have been enjoying 24/7 power supply since “Koriteh”. The government has indicated that this arrangement will be reciprocated in other “close to the border” communities. Hopefully, Gambians will witness marked improvement in power and water supply by mid 2018.
      Meanwhile, revelations of ridiculously large sums of cash withdrawals from the Central Bank, on the instructions of Yaya Jammeh, and presumably for the benefit of Yaya Jammeh, continue to be made on a daily basis. No wonder, NAWEC is crippled.

      • Bax
        Thank God that our country have illustrious sons like you who are non partisan, highly educated, patriotic and sane. Babu Soli is a ”sick joke” whose criticisms are based not on facts or common sense but hatred,jealousy,pettiness and damn right idiocy. The only educated Gambian who can’t see beyond his own shadow.
        He totally ignored the ugly revelations at the commission, from huge cash withdrawals without proper protocol, to the deliberate abuse of power and privilege by Jammeh and his thugs, yet he is going about accusing every other person of corruption without a shred of evidence. The man is a contradiction, a liar and a pompous buffoon.
        GO TO HELL BABU SOLI WITH YOUR BIAS CRITICISM.

  4. They haven’t bought a Las Vegas casino yet.

    The Dunes…isn’t that where Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis used to hand out.?

    seems comedians attract comedians.

    Maybe your master has bought 21st Century Fox..as well.???

  5. Babu Soli, A you okay.

    Just wish and hope you a doing fine. What a monday it was.

  6. Bax,
    You are just NUMBED. I have always reiterated that there are acute problems in all sectors of our social and economic lives. But you still don’t understand my statements or you are deliberately playing the FOOL’s card.
    Our problems are always present, from the British to Jawara to President Jammeh to your foolhardy Barrow. What I have been saying all the time is that when or what time moratorium does your illiterate Barrow need to embark on ameliorating those problems? 1 year, 2 years, 3 years, 4 years, 5 years….?
    Whilst they (the bitty non-existent Coalition) promised to change our conditions in their tell-tale propaganda campaigns, the first set of priorities as seen in their actions was to visit Marabouts in Senegal, go on wedding trips, pay useless courtesy calls on leaders in Congo Brazzaville, Paris, Brussels, hold useless inauguration ceremonies, refurbish offices…….WHILE OUR ACUTE PROBLEMS WERE IGNORED!
    That’s the reality. That is no longer a President Jammeh problem, it only depicts the inefficiency, hypocrisy, selfishness, corruption of your INEPT administrattion.
    Look Bax, President Jammeh embarked on his laudable projects just a week into flushing out Ex-President Jawara. We haven’t seen any MOVE by your INEFFICIENT CLIQUE OF FOOLISH ADMINISTRATORS to improve our people’s conditions. But only you and the IDIOTIC Nasty Natty Dread wouldn’t see that reality.
    There is a commission of inquiry solely about President Jammeh, not Ex-President Jawara or the colonial administartion. Unless, that partisan board of corrupt commission personnel produces their report, what foregone conclusions can you make?
    Your corrupt, tribalist administration with a Bristish Argos watchman at the summit of matters has already received millions of grants/aids from their benefactor imperalist administrations. And the 2017 taxes collected from the people. Where is the money?
    Nonetheless, they are gradually coming to their senses by visiting the most problematic areas of our economic and social sectors (than sitting IDIOTICALLY in their AC offices), streaming down the STUPID and CORRUPTIBLE travelling allowances/emoluments that the patriotic-minded citizens have decried, NOT you and Nasty Natty Dread.

  7. Babu Soli
    What is new in your innuendo, hate filled piece of rubbish? You idiotic blind fool. Jammeh embarked on his evil scheming projects of stealing our meager resources from day one of coming to power and only a cock-sucking nincompoop like you will ignore that fact. Our country is facing insurmountable difficulties as a result of Jammeh’s 22 years of misrule and mismanagement of our dwindling resources with the tacit support of gutless idiots like you, a confused professor who defined people by their clothes, or the jobs they did while studying abroad. President Barrow was democratically elected in a free and fair election by the Gambian electorate. The jobs he did or the clothes he wore are irrelevant to our needs as a nation ravaged by the greed of Jammeh and his thugs. You envious petty little man, envious of the AC offices, compared to your back breaking job of teaching imperialist hires to whom you live your subservient existence instead of the motherland. Those who can’t see good in fellow men have nothing good to show about themselves either. You are worst of humanity Babu.

  8. Nasty Natty Dread
    Come on IDIOT! You are still LICKING the cream of what President Jammeh left behind, you FOOL. What an IDIOTIC conformist. The job one does and the clothes one wears can tell well about an individual from the observation of an educated analyst not a STUPID illiterate like you.
    Who do I have to be jealous of? Do you know my conditions to say I’m envious of their old-fashioned AC offices? You are so STUPID that you can’t even imagine the comfortable and well prepared amenities of a professor in Holland. You are an UTTER IDIOT! There is no need to dispute that with you, from your slavish Mauritian enclave.
    Your inefficient, corrupt, tribalist, selfish, influence-peddling administrators in power have no blueprints for social and economic policies, no expertise in development administration and of course cannot control/administer the numerous needs of our poor.
    The only social and economic improvements they have found and still continue to enjoy since coming to office are the ones provided by President Jammeh. Your bitty government’s politico-administrative policy is only based on getting access to economic power and personal wealth. It is characteristic of the colonial and Jawara administrations, the stagnant, dysfunctional and decadent periods of our living.
    YOU DISGRACEFUL NEOCOLONIALIST REACTIONARY IMP!

  9. It is a shame that rather than discussing the challenges in Gambia with a view to proferring solutions, both of you,Soli and Natty Dread, are busy trading insults. The truth is Soli is supporting the former despot,Jammeh, blindly while Natty Dread is also supporting Barrow blindly. I believe Barrow is not perfect and constructive criticisms should be allowed. So let us try to have informed commentaries on how to move Gambia forward rather than indulging in destructive arguments. And by the way, I am not a Gambian but a fellow West African who wants your country to prosper after the storm.

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