News Story

FREETOWN: NEW PEOPLE CORRESPONDENT: Reports reaching The New People indicate that the APC government's electrification plans may be in trouble. Mr. O. Matthew Edevbie, the CEO of one of the Independent Power Providers (IPPs), Income Electrix, is an unhappy man. Sources indicate that the government had requested his Income Electrix company to bring in an additional 15MWs of generating capacity for the Wellington site. Income Electrix is said to have brought the additional generating plants which are at the moment housed in containers at the Queen Elizabeth II Quay in Freetown. However, the APC government has now changed its mind because it cannot even afford to pay for the existing generating capacity. Income Electrix is now faced with the possibility of having to re-ship its generating plants to Nigeria.

President Koroma has parroted the gradually unreliable supply of electricty as the single most impressive achievement by his government even as most Sierra Leoneans are going to bed hungry and the prices of essential commodities and transportation are shooting through the roof. Yet the cost of maintaining this propaganda talking point has been very high with the alleged cost of diesel for generating electricity up to nearly $7 million a weekly. The problem has been complicated by serial and widespread delinquencies by electricity consumers in paying their electricity bills.

Some of the government's backers for the electricity project like the World Bank have lately expressed healthy skepticism about the viability and sustainbility of the plan. They have also been unhappy that the government has failed to be fully transparent on sundry arrangements it has entered into unilaterally with Independent Power Providers (IPPs) including Income Electrix of Nigeria.