CONGO: Power shortfall a nightmare for Brazzaville residents

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

BRAZZAVILLE, 2 May 2005 (IRIN) - The destruction of high-voltage cables and the sabotage of electricity switchyards during the civil wars from June to October 1997 and from 1998 to 2002 in the Republic of Congo have crippled the energy-supply sector of this petroleum-rich nation.

The drop in electric output and frequent power cuts have become a fact of life for residents of Brazzaville, the nation's capital, and Point-Noire, the largest commercial city. Together, these cities form the hub of Congo's economic life and account for half of the country's three million people.

The electricity switchyard and the supply line running from the Moukoukoulou Dam, built in Mindouli, in the political administrative department of Pool, have been badly damaged. In addition, the network of the state-owned power company, the Société nationale d'électricité (SNE), is an outdated relic from the colonial era. Making matters worse is the fact that SNE has a monopoly on power production and distribution nationwide.

The already abysmal level of service is further compromised by theft and vandalism. It is common practice for people to tap into overhead power lines and draw electricity for free. Sometimes, they destroy electricity meters to avoid paying charges.

Normally, the SNE needs to produce 75 megawatts of electricity per day to supply some 200,000 people in Brazzaville. However, it is unable to meet this requirement and, as a result, has to buy 60 megawatts of power daily from the Inga hydroelectric dam in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Despite this measure, SNE is unable to satisfy its customers. This is because the Société d'électricité de Kinshasa (SNEL), which sells to SNE, is plagued by frequent technical breakdowns at its power stations and by low levels of water at the dam.

As a result, over the past few years, there has not been a single day when Brazzaville has not experienced power cuts; a factor that has led the SNE to operate a load-shedding regime whereby it supplies parts of the city with electricity at different times but never the entire city with power all the time.

THE PRESENT SITUATION

The power problem is particularly hard on residents of Brazzaville's high-density neighbourhoods and those of its surrounding districts. For many, a connection to SNE’s power grid is prohibitively expensive. The connection alone costs 83,444 francs CFA (about US $165).

"This sum does not take into account accessories which the user must pay," Michel Engoulé, a SNE technician, said.

In all, he said, to get hooked up to SNE the customer would need to pay nearly 300,000 francs ($594), which does not take into account monthly bills. All this on an average person's monthly wage of 38,500 francs (about $76) is difficult for most residents, and those who can afford this financial outlay remain dissatisfied with the service.

"Despite regular payments, power remains a rare commodity. Once we spent the entire week without power. SNE just turns off power at will," Lucie Goma, a single mother of five children in the city's Ouenzé neighbourhood, said.

The power cuts, she said, damaged household electrical appliances and made it impossible to run small-scale businesses that depend on electrical power.

"I have stopped selling homemade drinks because my freezer has been destroyed," she said.

The electricity outages also mean darkened streets. Until relatively recently, street lighting had not been provided in new growth areas of the city since the country's first president, Fulbert Youlou, introduced them in 1960 to 1963. Brazzaville Deputy Mayor Hugues Ngouolondélé said that since he came to City Hall in 2003, the city had installed 800 lampposts.

However, most of the streets are still unlit, making some areas dangerous at night. One such area is near the Tsieme cemetery in the northern part of the city. The avenue running alongside the cemetery is a high pedestrian-traffic route and, Guy Ondaye, a resident near the cemetery area, said, "There's not a single day without some act of antisocial behaviour."

The lack of consistent power also affects hospitals, clinics and other essential institutions; thereby posing potentially fatal public-health consequences.

In the past the university teaching hospital of Brazzaville, the Centre Hospitalier et Universitaire (CHU), relied on SNE for its power supply, with disastrous results.

"When the CHU only relied on SNE for power, many people died under surgery because of power cuts, especially at the maternity ward," Micheline Soussa, a midwife with 15 years service in the ward, said. "Now, the power problem has been solved: The hospital invested in automatic generators."

Similarly, at Talangaï hospital in the east of the city, the Italian oil giant Ena (formerly Agip) has rehabilitated the facility and installed a generator. Private clinics in high-density neighbourhoods have followed suit but the excessive noise created by the generators is worsening the condition of hypertensive patients.

A LOSE-LOSE SITUATION

Power vacuums in areas where underground cables have been stolen and where electricity is inconsistent have led small-business owners to take matters into their own hands.

"We have power one in two days. So I prefer to use my generator so that I would not discourage my large clientele from patronising my business. But it [the expense of running a generator] is a big loss to me," Guy Bazolo, the owner of a cyber café, said. And whether or not he has electricity, he still has to pay the SNE.

The SNE says 98 percent of its electricity consumers are not metered. Because of this, the company bills clients at a fixed rate of 15,000 francs (about $30) once every two months. This measure, said SNE General Manager Jean Joseph Imangué, resulted in a 15-billion-franc ($29.7 million) loss for the company every year.

SNE says that to solve the problem it needs some 50,000 meters to cover the entire city. In 2004, it received money from partners such as La Congolaise de Banque, a local bank, to buy 1,500 meters. However, the utility's finances remain fragile.

"Our company exists only in name. If it were a bakery, it would have already collapsed," Imangué said.

The lack of energy supply has hindered socioeconomic development of the ROC, which by 2002 owed the DRC 20 billion francs (about $39.3 million).

Plans to privatise and resuscitate SNE have failed due to politics and lack of funding. One attempt at privatisation fell through because of the 1997 civil war, and other efforts have failed because of disagreements between the government and prospective buyers on terms of the privatisation.

When it comes to big business, there are larger issues at stake. Projects that could potentially benefit thousands of people are stalled or abandoned altogether because of the Republic of Congo’s shortcomings in the power-supply sector.

A Canadian firm, Magnésium Alloy Congo, and a South African company, Old Mutual Properties, had wanted to launch separate projects to mine magnesium and aluminium in the southern department of Kouilou, whose largest city is Point-Noire. The magnesium mine alone would have required an investment of $750 million.

The companies were forced to pull the plug on the projects because there was no infrastructure to support such endeavours, leaving the ROC, once again, in the dark.

[ENDS]