WENRECo performance is poor, says Okoro MP

BY ANDREW COHEN AMVESI

ARUA. The Okoro County Member of Parliament (MP) in Zombo district, Gabriel Okumu has rated the performance of West Nile Rural Electrification Company (WENRECo) as being poor.

Okumu is among many leaders and locals in West Nile who are not happy with the unreliable electricity being supplied to the people in the region by WENRECo and Electromaxx.

This was evidenced on Thursday when one of the Kampala based bloggers facilitated by the Electricity Regulatory Authority (ERA) asked the MP during a visit to Nyagak power dam to rate the performance of WENRECo.

In response, Okumu told the journalist that the performance of WENRECo is totally poor when it comes to power generation and supply in the region.

“The performance of WENRECo is poor. We have lost so many lives yet God gave life for free and it is not in anybody’s thinking to terminate life. Many children have died while being operated, many people who are on life support have lost their lives because of poor power supply by WENRECo,” Okumu said.

“To the people of West Nile, any person who loves West Nile should not clap for WENRECo, WENRECo actually messed us up. When you are giving a service, you give the service for any person to appreciate your service. So, I would like to say that their performance has been very poor in the region,” Okumu added.

Okumu made the remarks after receiving the members of the Parliamentary Committee on Environment and Natural Resources at Nyagak Power Dam which is located in his Constituency.

The committee members led by Dr. Emmanuel Otaala, the Budama West County Member of Parliament (MP) were in the region for a fact-finding mission on the unstable and unreliable power being supplied by WENRECo and Electromaxx.

However, during the visit, Okumu recommended that all documents including the agreement of WENRECo and the government, Nyagak project design papers and the Electromaxx agreement documents should be availed to the MPs for scrutiny so that appropriate action is taken.

In the meantime, he said as MPs from the region, they are not giving up on the demand to be connected to the national grid.

“We are not going to be blind-folded that because we are now on course with Nyagak III, we forget about connection to the national grid. Our agenda is to be connected to the national grid once and for all and that is the bottom line. I would like to assure the people of West Nile that we are in course to be connected to the national grid,” Okumu maintained.

In his remarks, Dr. Otaala said what they are investigating is whether the supply of electricity in West Nile is stable and reliable or not, but also to find out what the challenges are in respect to WENRECo and Electromaxx power generation in Arua and Nyagak.

“So, I would like to say that some of our findings include the fact that there is very erratic power supply in the West Nile. As we were in Arua for example, power went off three times and that is a routine and it is not something new. We further investigated to find out why? And I must say that we are going to dig deeper why WENRECo together with Electromaxx are unable to supply power to the West Nile sub-region in a more reliable manner,” Otaala promised.

As a result, Otaala summoned ERA, WENRECo and Electromaxx officials to appear before the committee at Parliament with written defence and all the necessary documents regarding the matter on Monday.