The shortfall according to officials accrued from the modifications of its electricity supply license by the Electricity Regulatory Authority in May which caused the lag in the recovery of the regulatory income. “So for me, when am assessing the performance of Umeme, I look at its capital investment programme, I look at are they reducing their losses, are they recovering the income that is due, are they collecting all the money, from operation efficiency; are they reducing operating cost and are they growing the sector? And when I look at those elements as we disclosed in our press release, I think the company is pushing on very well in that front. And except for this impairment charge which we, unfortunately, have to pass because of the accounting rules.... You can imagine they are saying impair even when you see where the money is due, they say don’t recognize the revenue, that’s a dilemma.” Said, Selestino Babungi – Managing Director – Umeme.

Consumers of electricity dealing with high power tariffs currently at 12 US dollar Cents or 426 shillings per unit may have to wait until the government negotiations with the International financiers on restructuring the Bujagali Energy Limited loan. “So the idea is to get that tariff down. And if they can get it down to a clientele figure but whatever figure that comes down to will help in the effort of bringing them down the tariff, there is no doubt about that.” Said, Sam Zimbe – General Manager, Regulatory Affairs – Umeme Ltd.

The daunting factor for the whole sector though was who would consume the power that was now being generated that was in the excess of 750 MGW? “But what should worry us is what we should work on; ahead of us is what we see is 600 MGW coming from Karuma, we have 183 MGW coming from Isimba and therefore we must expand the distribution system, the transmission system, on top of attracting quality customers in terms of industrial customers....”