The president of the Republic of Gambia,Dr Yahya Jammeh has expressed what he called 'his displeasure and disappointment' over the recent performance of the country's only utilities provider, the National Water and Electricity Company (Nawec), stressing that the erratic electricity supply leaves much to be desired.

His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr Yahya Jammeh, who cut his vacation short to attend to this problem that has created an outcry in the Greater Banjul Area in recent times, was speaking Wednesday afternoon at State House in Banjul, during a lengthy meeting he held with the senior management and Board of Directors of the country's utility company.

The interface that provided the opportunity for the Gambian leader to make his stance clear with regards to the status quo that he strongly deplored, also availed the officials of Nawec the opportunity to explain the problems grappling the utility company, as well as the measures they are putting in place to remedy the situation.

But President Jammeh, in his heavy-worded statement to the officials warned them against gross negligence, and laisser-faire attitude to work, saying "I am giving you [Nawec] and the Board the last chance".

He said: "The reason why I called you is in response to a meeting I directed you to have with the secretary general and head of Civil Service to tell you of my displeasure with what is going on with regards to the very erratic epileptic electricity supply."

The power outages experienced in recent times, according to the Gambian leader has caused a lot of misery for the average person. He also observed that such a situation in some cases causes a lot of damages to certain electronic equipment and appliances.

While reiterating that he is giving Nawec management and its Board of Directors one last chance, the president warned that the people employed to do the job must either fulfill their responsibilities or leave.

While stressing that it is a choice to either work or leave, the president noted that the officials cannot do things the way they want it. He further stressed that officials must not wait until there is a crisis before acting, something he described as "bad management".

He added: "If you come to me before a problem, I will understand. But don't wait until there is mayhem and then you say we couldn't do it because we are cash in balance. That is not my problem and it is bad management.

After all Nawec is not a charity institution, but it collects bills. So that's why I called you to talk to you because from your report I realised that there are lots of things that are going wrong in Nawec."

The Gambian leader observed that one thing that clearly stands out in the whole thing is the lack of routine maintenance, because as he puts it, "if you have a proper maintenance schedule, I don't think you are crazy enough to shut two generators down and then start to scout for spare parts".

He stressed that one cannot put two generators down and expect that there would be normal electricity supply. President Jammeh underscored that for the country to have a sustainable development, there must be industries, the development of which he said cannot happen without reliable electricity supply.

He pointed out that they have done everything humanely possible as a government to make things better for Nawec but noted that the company has fallen short of expectations.

He continued: "When I got the report that you submitted, I decided that it is high time that we sit face-to-face. A lot of things that are[in the report] tantamount to either lack of proper coordination, lack of planned maintenance or altogether gross negligence of what you are supposed to do.

One part of the report that made me annoyed is where you are saying that the parts are available and you are trying to fix the problem as soon as possible within the shortest possible time; and towards the end of the report you stated that you have placed orders for the parts and you are waiting for them.

Now the confusion here is which parts are already on the ground and which parts you are waiting on? "You have one major power station and one sub-station - Brikama. How would the average layman like me understand this problem barely three weeks after the inauguration of what you claimed to be a brand new generator?

I think I made mention at the Brikama Plant that after inauguration of this we will not have a serious problem with electricity. Then one of you suddenly said the generator is not connected and not on yet, we just put it on for the purpose of the inauguration - we have to start loading it.

But I didn't expect that things will go this bad where you are on maintenance and then Brikama also is on maintenance at the same time. Unless it was an emergency situation beyond control, if it was just routine maintenance for both Kotu and Brikama, this shows the serious lack of coordination because you should know that if you put 12 megawatts out of the system now, you are going to create serious problem.

And if you at any moment put two generators to be shut down and be on maintenance at the same time for a said period, you are also asking for trouble because you will not be able to satisfy the people. So either this was deliberately done because I could not get a genuine reason from your report."

The Gambian leader put it to the Nawec officials that if they have had a proper schedule maintenance, then why would they wait until they shut down the generators and then started to order the spare parts?

He pointed out that if those responsible for power generation did their work, they should know when the engines are due for maintenance and order the parts ahead of the time so that when they shut them down, they wouldn't wait for them because they will be on the ground.

"So it does not make sense for you to shut the generator down and then you ordered the spare parts unless you don't have a routine maintenance. You should know when the generators are due for maintenance and you should sequence them in such a way that you can have the whole plant maintained without anybody noticing it," he stated.

President Jammeh, in describing the situation as unacceptable said: "Every time you create so much havoc all you do is to come up with a routine statement that a lot of generators are down for maintenance and that is why we are experiencing this problem. Every year this is the same kind of problem.

Now I just want this to be very clear - you either do your work or go home both the board and Nawec; and that your excuses are unacceptable. But I am giving you the last chance."

He adds: "Where are your technicians who are assigned to the plants to make sure that things work because all the monitoring mechanisms are there? But aren't you ashamed? Every year people will complain and then you will come up with a routine press release that we are down for maintenance."

The Gambian leader further stressed that the organogram of Nawec must be revamped, restructured and reorganised with a view to know who is responsible for what, while reminding the officials that the country's utility company is a national asset that belongs to all Gambians. He then stated the need for all and sundry to work together sincerely and endeavour to be true, honest and sacrifice for the country in its development and progress. The president noted that he will not shelve his responsibilities to the development of this country, adding that this is what is expected of everyone else.

The Gambian leader also took the Nawec board to task for not living up to its expectations to the company, reminding them of their responsibilities to the management and supervision of the company.

The ministers of Basic and Secondary Education, Trade, Integration and Employment, and Youths and Sports, Fatou Lamin Faye, Abdou Kolley and Sheriff Gomez all described electricity as a sin qua non to the development process of the country, while enjoining the management and Board of Directors of Nawec to redouble their efforts.

The ministers also underscored the need for Nawec to take advantage of the advancing technologies to reach their services close to the doorsteps of the consumers. The chairman Board of Directors of Nawec, Mustapha Colley, assured the Gambian leader that they have taken note of his advice and will live up to expectations.

Colley agreed with the president that they should not sit and wait until there is a problem and start asking for money. However he indicated that planned maintenance is one of the cardinal issues that is always raised by the board that Brikama and Kotu must synchronize their maintenance.

He explains: "What has actually happened of late is just not lack of coordination but the result of the fact that while the planned maintenance was going on at Brikama, and they suppose to have three generators running, one of them suddenly developed problems and in order to avoid a catastrophe, they decided to shut it down and this was why Brikama lost 50 percent.

Kotu as you may recall, G6 failed quite sometime ago - it went into a major rehabilitation and when it was re-commissioned some problems were detected and being a very stable and reliable generator, it was felt by the engineers that it is safe to replace some components and this was done."

The newly appointed managing director of Nawec, Ebrima Sanyang gave a run down of the plans they have to bring back the system to normalcy. Among these, he explained include the fact that they have currently gotten back Watsila officials in the country.

He said: "We have endeavoured to make sure that we get the executives of Watsila in the country. As we speak we had a meeting with them this morning. The other reason why they are here is we want to conclude on maintenance and advisory agreement on the operation of the power plant and this also includes the contract for the supply of spare parts to the availability to the plant." The meeting was chaired by Momodou Saidy, press officer at State House.

Source: The Daily Observer