Thursday, March 28, 2024

ZESCO fails to install power to Sinazongwe irrigation Schemes

Share

By Tovin Ngombe

Agriculture experts and the African Development Bank (ADB) has said the Zambia Electricity Corporation (ZESCO) has failed to install power where irrigation Schemes are earmarked to be constructed in Sinazongwe district despite being paid two years ago.

ADB Agriculture Specialist Lewis Bangwe said at the tour of the Small Scale Irrigation Project (SSIP) in Sinazongwe that it was critical for power to be installed at Nzenga before construction of the irrigation Scheme commences in three months time.

Mr. Bangwe said at the moment the SSIP in Sinazongwe would focus on two projects at Buleya Malima which is already completed and at Nzenga which is situated near Chief Sinazongwe’s palace.

He said the remaining two projects at Simupande and at Sinazongwe would be moved forwards and government would take up the challenge to ensure that they were also constructed.

Mr. Bangwe noted that communities that would be aggrieved as a resulted of the delay in starting the construction of the Irrigation Scheme should be encouraged to avoid their losing hope since the project was still on course.

However, Sinazongwe Acting District Agriculture Coordinator Tundu Kaonga said the issue of ZESCO’s failure to installed power to the areas earmarked for irrigation schemes has been outstanding and nothing has been done.

Mr. Kaonga said money was paid to ZESCO in 2004 to have power be installed but they have failed to bring it despite making several appeals to them.

He said the failure to have the power installed at Nzenga would further delay the construction of the Scheme because the contractor may require power to execute certain works.
Chief Irrigation Engineer under the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperative Gorge Sikuleka told the farmers at Nzenga to work with government to ensure that the project was completed on time.

Mr. Sekuleka said government got a loan on behalf of the farmers to construct irrigation Schemes in Sinazongwe to caution the high levels hunger in the district.

Nzenga Community Chairperson for Small Scale Irrigation Scheme Goerge Jalata thanked government for their plans to construct the Scheme.

He said the construction of the Irrigation Scheme would reduce the hunger situation in the district which receives extreme weather as there was either drought or floods.

10 COMMENTS

  1. ZESCO is now becoming a failure in all areas can those managers send their men to install power since they were paid. Foolish managers. wat explanation can you give for failing to help sinazonagwe which is hunger stricken and irrigation Scheme will be their only hope once completed. Stop frustrating govt efforts that is UPND is popular in Sinazongwe becauase od such lazy managers delaying govt projects.

  2. For how long is our calling for Sisala’s blood going to fall on deaf hears.Sisala, a memeber of the Muwelewele family tree is the worst under perfvorming manager mto have ever run ZESCO.having a liability like him running such a strategic parastatal organisation is conter productive. with Sisala at the helm of Zesco, we may as well forget about economic developement in general and agricultural dev. in particular. Where has he taken the irrigation monies his firm received from from ADB two yrs ago?If grant based institutions like PACRO cont

  3. If PACRO can declared dividents, with such a limited revenue base, why should ZESCO which has a lot of customers and receives AID from donors be in such a mess? Compare ZESCO for instance durin the time of Mwansa and today under dull Sisala.
    Sisala must go….!

  4. Well, I thank Dr. Bangwe for the important weakenesses in ZESCO such as the one reported in this mutende. ZESCO has let down a lot of development in the country. It is a baby of the government and always being protected like an egg. ZESCO is owing many people millions of Kwacha which the company has been paid to instal electricity in houses. The excuse the company is giving is lack of poles. Who is supposed to provide those poles? Are they not part of the cost of installation charges. You waste people’s time talking about RURAL ELECTRIFICATION as if electricity will be free when you are failing to take electricity to those who have already paid for it. 2004 to date nothing coz u chewed all m

  5. I thank Dr. Bangwe for revealingthe important weakenesses in ZESCO such as the one reported in this mutende. ZESCO has let down a lot of development in the country. It is a baby of the government and always being protected like an egg. ZESCO is owing many people millions of Kwacha which the company has been paid to instal electricity in houses. The excuse the company is giving is lack of poles. Who is supposed to provide those poles? Are they not part of the cost of installation charges. You waste people’s time talking about RURAL ELECTRIFICATION as if electricity will be free when you are failing to take electricity to those who have already paid for it. 2004 to date nothing coz u chewed al

  6. ZESCo should be accountable to all the monies it is collecting from people for installation of electricity to their premises. The company should publish a list of such indicating the date of payments and you will notice that some paid as far back as 1999 but have not been connected. They busy paying themselves heft salaries and allowances at the expense of the services to the clients. Mwanawasa government has no eyes to see all these embarrassments the company is bringing to the nation. ZESCO means Zambians Expect no Electricity Company. There is too much monopoly.I will start my own electricity company so ZESCO don’t be jealousy like you did for that guy you know.

  7. L have never heard of an energy company that makes losses. Surprisingly, Botswana is a desert but whenever you want to drink water from the tap you will ever drink clean tap water. The same thing applies to power (electricity). There is no loadshading and yet those guys haven’t got a single water fall-maybe I don’t know. Although a large percentage of foodstuff is from SA the farms in Bots are ever green. Their cattle are very fat. I don’t think they have acement manufacturing company but cement is affordably ever there. So how come zesco is loss making with no competator? They have retarded all forms of development in the country shamelessly. Lets start importing power from Botswana.

  8. I have said it before, those ZESCO people are thieves. They don’t provide the service they collect money for. Somebody should have ben fired over the Sinazongwe issue.

    Right now, in the ares where I stay we are paying fixed charge of K190,000 per month yet the service is still poor. They are not keen on installing pre-paid meters coz they know we will be paying less. They are even able to send their football team to camp in Dubai using ill-gotten money. Sisala must go.

Comments are closed.

Read more

Local News

Discover more from Lusaka Times-Zambia's Leading Online News Site - LusakaTimes.com

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading