ONGERI JOHN, Dar es Salaam | Friday
DROUGHT-ravaged Tanzania has introduced electricity rationing as shrinking dams begin to cutting into its hydro-electric capacity.
Energy ministry permanent secretary Patrick Rutabazimbwa said major rain catchment areas had been hit by a year-long drought, drying up important feeder dams for the country’s hydro-electricity generating stations.
Rutabazimbwa added that a financial crisis at the Tanzania Electricity Supply Company (Tanesco) was also undermining the country’s ability to run its thermal power generation stations.
Tanesco managing director Baruany Luhanga confirmed the parastatal was unable to meet rising operational costs at many of the older stations, and was therefore unable to guarantee uninterrupted power supplies.
Tanesco is currently struggling to collect over US$60m in outstanding accounts from domestic and industrial clients who had refused to pay their bills since June because of the erratic power supply.
Systematic vandalism of electricity switching stations, transformers and other infrastructure by thieves in search of components, oils and wire were also causing havoc, he said.
Rutabazimbwa stressed that Tanzania was not the only East African country forced to ration electricity, pointing out that neighbouring Kenya had been rationing power supplies for almost one year due to similar problems.
“Our major challenges, besides this drought, remain our inability to purchase enough fuel or spare parts to allow our thermal power plants to compensate for the drop in hydro-electricity supplies,” he said.
Health workers in Tanzania’s capital Dar es Salaam have meanwhile warned of cholera and related dangerous diseases after water shortages force many of the city’s 3,2 million residents to use rivers and ponds for ablutions.
The water shortage, caused by a major pipe burst on the city’s River Ruvu border, has disrupted supplies in three-quarters of Dar es Salaam.
“This is very dangerous and could spark a major outbreaks of cholera, dysentery and diarrhoea. It would be disastrous,” warned a city centre clinic manager, Dr Raphael Semizige.
Dar es Salaam’s Water and Sewerage Authority (Dawasa) declined to comment on the crisis this week other than to assure it was “working around the clock to restore normal supplies”. – African Eye News Service