Rwandan President Paul Kagame has helped Zimbabwe secure $800 million for a rural electrification programme to help end the country’s perennial power shortages, President Emmerson Mnangagwa has disclosed.
President Mnangagwa told a ruling Zanu PF party rally at the weekend that President Kagame will visit Zimbabwe this month to launch the project, but did not provide more details about the funders or the nature of the electrification programme.
“We have a programme, which is coming at the end of this month,” President Mnangagwa said.
“President Kagame of Rwanda is visiting us for this occasion.
“This is after I spoke to him to say fellow brother, our country Zimbabwe is on sanctions but we have a programme to ensure everyone has access to electricity wherever they are.
“President Kagame then spoke to his friends and he secured $800 million. So that is the facility that he is coming to launch.”
The Zimbabwean ruler said the southern African country will copy a rural electrification programme that was rolled out in Rwanda.
According to the government-owned Rwanda Energy Group, as of August this year, 73.9 percent of Rwandan households had access to electricity.
Rwanda has set a target to have 100 percent of the households enjoying access to electricity by 2024 with 70 percent connected to the grid while 30 percent will be using off-grid solutions.
“If you go to Rwanda and see what President Kagame has done in the villages, it is well organised,” President Mnangagwa said.
“Over there, they work in unity with government assistance.
“That way, there is no family left behind because every household is assisted out of poverty.”
World Bank figures show that 52.7 percent of Zimbabwe’s households have access to electricity.
The southern African country has lately been suffering from electricity shortages due to lack of foreign currency to import power from neighbouring countries to cover for a deficit in locally generated electricity.
Zimbabwe has in recent years been upgrading its major thermal and hydro power stations with funding from China.
“There is a shortage of electricity in the country and the SADC region at large,” President Mnangagwa added.
“But we are addressing that and through the help of our friends in China we are rehabilitating Hwange Thermal Power Station and in November we will have 300 megawatts coming into our national grid while another 300 megawatts will be added by March next year to make it 600 megawatts.”
Zimbabwe’s peak electricity demand stands at 2,100 megawatts a day, but the country generates an average of 1,500 megawatts daily and the deficits is covered through imports from neighbouring countries such as Zambia and Mozambique.
