Government moving with speed on electricity supply Lilongwe Area 50 residents
Minister of Energy, Ibrahim Matola has promised residents of Area 50 in the Capital City, Lilongwe that Government is moving with speed to supply them with the all-important electricity.
This follows the supply of a transformer by Electricity Supply of Malawi (ESCOM) to connect power to this area which has had no electricity since people established new settlements there.
Speaking when the Minister toured the area, legislator for the area, Alfred Jiya disclosed that for a long time, he has been under pressure from his constituents to have power supplied to the area, saying the situation has been pathetic and disheartening.
“Being one of the areas within the city, it has been sad that my constituents have been unable to carry out various small scale businesses due to lack of electricity,” MP Jiya said.
“The businesses include those of salon, barbers shops, welding and general shops, which could sell perishables like meat and other products.”
He thus expressed his delight at ESCOM’s provision of the transformer which signals that shortly the area will be connected.
Matola visited the area in order to get first hand information about the situation, saying government will do everything possible to have uninterrupted power in this area, saying: “It is the intention of the President Chakwera-led administration to increase the number of people who should be supplied with electricity — including residents of Area 50 and other surrounding places.
“It is for this reason that my Ministry directed ESCOM to quickly connect people with power, hence the provision of the transformer,” he said, while commending people in the area for their patience and also determination to present their issues in a non-violent manner.
In his address on the State of the Nation (SONA) in February, President Chakwera said the energy sector was top priority and promised to restore Kapichira Hydro Power Plant with speed that was damaged due to the 2022 Cyclone Ana — which was successfully brought back to life in May.
It ended the continuous load shedding and following the restoration, Electricity Generation Company Malawi Limited (EGENCO) went on to announce that it will now turn its focus on continuing its implementation of power projects — such as Salima Solar, Kam’mwamba coal fired plant in Balaka and the expansion of Wovwe Power Station.
Malawi also signed an Interconnector Project with Mozambique, which will allow the country to import and export power to the Southern African Power Pool including Malawi.
In June 2022, Malawi also commissioned the 20 megawatts Golomoti Power Station with battery energy storage system (BESS) and also secured a US$25 million financing agreement to enable Golomoti Solar to capitalise this investment in solar power generation, as well as similar agreements with Elsewedy and AMEA Power, as announced by Chakwera in his February SONA.
“Similarly, the construction of the 21 megawatts Serengeti Solar Power Station in Nkhotakota is near completion and will be commissioned in the coming weeks,” he had said.
“More broadly, we are increasing access to electricity through in-house wiring for 30,325 low-income households and free electricity connection for 32,325 under Ndawala Initiative through the Rural Electrification Fund.
“We are also increasing access to electricity through grid connection of 180,000 ESCOM customers under the World Bank-funded Malawi Electricity Access Project (MEAP), to be completed next year, as well as the construction of 16 mini-grids under MEAP, MAREP — the UNDP supported access to clean and renewable energy (ACRE) project, which will connect 200,000 off-grid customers by next year as well.”
At the launch of the MEAP in Lilongwe last year, ESCOM Chief Executive Officer, Kamkwamba Kumwenda said they targeted to connect 30,000 customers by the end of March, 2023 — even for grass thatched households.
Under the project, there are customers requiring a service drop, some requiring one or more pole and those requiring a transformer. Phase 1 was targeted at service drop connections in order to clear backlog with the other categories to be connected under phase 2.
Kumwenda also announced that ESCOM had secured 50,000 meters by then and was expecting delivery of poles, cables and conductors and also recruited design engineer & safeguard specialists under US$5 million technical assistance component of the project.
Minister of Energy Matola told the media then that the project was aimed at bringing the country’s on-grid electricity access rate to around 30% by 2030, from 12% as at the start of the project in 2020.
“For too long, Malawians have been deprived of having access to electricity,” he had said. “However, through the commitment of this Government to leave no-one behind, Malawians can now enjoy and share the benefits of this important service.”
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