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Construction Begins on Uganda's $799 Million Hydro Dam |
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| UGANDA: August 22, 2007 | ||
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KAMPALA - Construction of Uganda's new 250-megawatt hydropower dam began on the banks of the River Nile on Tuesday, with politicians and locals hoping it will spell an end to the country's power crisis.
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The Bujugali dam is estimated to cost $799 million. But President Yoweri Museveni said it was a clever financial decision as it will spare Uganda more of the high subsidies accruing after two years of serious shortages in the east African nation. "To avert the power shortages, emergency thermal plants have been installed, (but) you cannot imagine the loss caused by huge subsidies to bring down power tariffs," Museveni said at the launch in Jinja, 80 km (50 miles) east of the capital Kampala. "We must anticipate demand and produce electricity to always be ahead of demand," he told an audience that included the Aga Khan, leader of 15 million Shia Ismaili Muslims worldwide. The Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development is involved in the project, and the spiritual leader himself defended the mammoth construction criticised by environmentalists. "Hydroelectricity is clean energy advancing sustainable development while minimising its environmental impact," he said. Local lobby group the National Association of Professional Environmentalists has resisted the dam from the outset. Uganda generates most of its energy from hydroelectric turbines on the Nile River. But rising demand plus a recent drop in water levels of Lake Victoria, the Nile's source, have sparked regular power shortages and load-shedding.
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Story by Francis Kwera
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REUTERS NEWS SERVICE
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