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dam-l NYTimes on Kenya power crisis/LS
New York Times on Kenya's power crisis (mentions hydro imports from Uganda)
June 25, 2000
Brownouts in Kenya Highlight Its Chaos and Misrule
By IAN FISHER
NAIROBI, Kenya, June 24 -- The generator,
somewhere out back, groaned and the bare
bulbs blinked. Smokin Wanjala, a lawyer who
studies corruption in a nation where there is plenty to
study, walked up a dim stairway to his office just before
lunchtime.
"No power at home," he said. "No power at the office.
So it's darkness at noon."
It is indeed dark in Kenya these days, and not just
because electricity is in such short supply
that people are forced to dine by candlelight three or
four nights a week -- a minor
inconvenience given that people are also losing their
jobs. Even President Daniel arap Moi
has said Kenya -- once among the most stable and
prosperous nations in Africa -- is "facing
its worst-ever crisis."
The problems are many. But maybe the most worrisome
manifestation came two weeks ago
when elementary school students rioted for six hours.
They stoned a beer truck and then, as
newspaper cameras clicked away, drank the beer. The
children were angry because the driver
of a matatu -- the incomprehensibly dangerous vans that
serve as public transport here -- ran
over and killed a little boy named Oscar Boyi Simiyu.
It was only the day before that a matatu ran into the
Range Rover in which Mr. Moi himself
was riding. Thus chaos and misrule poetically collided
at a traffic circle near downtown. No
one was seriously hurt, except the driver, who said he
was later beaten up at Mr. Moi's official
residence, State House.
"It's not the same place I remember," Edward J.
Casselle, a United States deputy assistant
secretary for commerce, said this week. Mr. Casselle,
who traveled around Kenya in brighter
days two decades ago, is visiting to promote a new
American law aimed at spurring
investment in and trade with Africa -- arriving at a
distinctly pessimistic moment for Kenya's
business climate.
The actual climate has played a big part in bringing
Kenya's long-standing problems to what
many people here fear is near-crisis. Nearly
three-quarters of Kenyans -- about 22 million
people -- will be affected in one way or another by the
severe drought that is choking the
region, the government estimates. Of those, 2.2 million
face the serious prospect of starvation.
The Tana River, where the nation's five hydroelectric
dams are located, is low. So the
government has imposed strict power rationing: Most
homes with electricity -- only 10
percent of the nation -- have it only three or four
nights a week. Factories get power every
other day. Water rationing starts soon.
But even before the dry weather, the economy was
strangling from years of corruption and
poor management. The phones and roads are barely
passable. Students are rioting. There is
turmoil among the coffee and tea growers. Tourists,
afraid of runaway crime, are staying
away.
Through it all, Mr. Moi -- who has been in power for
almost 22 years -- and his government
have declined to accept any blame, though Kenya is so
corrupt that the World Bank and
International Monetary Fund cut off aid three years
ago. In several speeches, Mr. Moi has
mostly noted that God makes the weather -- and rain
feeds wells and hydroelectric dams.
"I am not a rainmaker, and Kenyans are not responsible
for the drought," he said this month
in a speech asking the world's rich nations to donate
$150 million to feed Kenya's hungry.
But many Kenyans cannot help but notice that
neighboring nations, hit as hard or worse by
dry weather, do not have nearly as many problems with
power. Or that one of Mr. Moi's top
aides, Nicholas Biwott, the former energy minister, has
been criticized in Parliament in recent
days for mismanaging construction in the 1980's of an
expensive dam in the Rift Valley.
Critics say the dam adds little to the nation's power grid.
Mr. Wanjala, the corruption expert and an official with
the Center for Law and Research here,
wondered why there has been so little investment in the
power system; why dams were not
built on other rivers; why Kenya never pursued a
planned deal with Uganda, its western
neighbor, which is spilling over with hydroelectric potential.
"What has not been clear to the Kenyan people is that
their day-to-day problems are not
necessarily natural," Mr. Wanjala said. "And once that
sinks in, it is quite possible that it will
be channeled into a serious challenge to the legitimacy
of this government."
Kenyans are clearly frustrated.
"It's a desperate situation," said one business leader,
who asked not to be quoted by name. "If
we don't fix power, the whole country will collapse."
It is unquestionably a bad time to work
for a business with a name like Luka's Electric
Welding, as does Edward Maina, 32, a "very
worried" electric welder. On a recent afternoon, he was
writing out a sales order in a huge
open air garage outside of downtown, but doing no
welding. The four power meters were dead still.
"This is the only place I get my daily bread," said Mr.
Maina, who has worked at Luka's for
eight years. "If things go bad I will go hungry."
In the industrial area of Nairobi, there is power only
every other day, and businessmen like C.
M. Waweru have already taken steps. The owner of an
electroplating company, he has already
cut the hours of four part-time workers, and is
seriously thinking about laying off some of his
20 regular workers. He worries his business itself
could come next.
"I think now the government is awake," he said with
hope in his voice. "I'm sure they think
about it day and night."
Maybe so, but the government has announced no plan,
except to wait until the short rains
start, in September or October.
Not everyone feels completely dismal about Kenya at the
moment. As a result of nearly a year
of work by Richard Leakey, a former opposition leader
whom Mr. Moi appointed to reform
the civil service, the International Monetary Fund and
World Bank seem poised to resume aid
in the next few months. Unlike nearly all its
neighbors, Kenya is not at war and never has
been since independence in 1963.
And Mr. Casselle, the Commerce Department official,
said he is confident Kenya will pull
through -- although it will be even better, he said, if
it enacts the reform measures required for
participation in the Africa trade bill.
"I am confident entrepreneurs will find a way to do
business -- profitable business -- in spite
of electricity problems, water problems, real problems.
"I know Kenya is in bad shape," he added. "But believe
me, there are places where it is a lot worse."
Still, a hairdresser here named Maggie Mukungu sat in
her shop, Ringlets, on a recent
afternoon, telling customers to come back some other
time when the electricity is on. Usually
the hairdressers receive a salary, but now they are
paid on commission because she does not
even think they can cover the rent this month.
"It's carelessness," she said, blaming the government.
"They don't know what they are doing.
They should think about that. But they don't plan. They
don't care about what happens to people."
After a morning of darkness, the lights suddenly
flickered to life. But the customers were gone.
"Now we have it," she said. "But no business. So we just wait."
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Lori Pottinger, Director, Southern Africa Program,
and Editor, World Rivers Review
International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, California 94703, USA
Tel. (510) 848 1155 Fax (510) 848 1008
http://www.irn.org
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