ZESA seeks $200m to connect new homes

Martin Kadzere : Senior Business Reporter

POWER utility Zesa Holdings says it requires at least $200 million to connect up to 138 new housing projects countrywide, spokesperson Mr Fullard Gwasira said last week. The housing projects have up to 102 000 customers waiting to be connected. Mr Gwasira said many projects remained unconnected despite the completion of housing projects.“ZETDC (a subsidiary of Zesa) is looking at increasing tbjkjkgheir revenue flows through this new business, but we are being hampered by lack of liquidity challenges to provide the backbone infrastructure in the respective residential areas,” said Mr Gwasira.

He said ZETDC was waiting for the delivery of up to 130 000 prepaid meters by end of this month.

“ZETDC is facing challenges in accessing long term funding for the construction of both high voltage and low tension lines, and as such is amenable to the idea of groups of customers who are willing to pool own resources to expedite the process of accessing power.”

ZETDC is supposed to provide the backbone infrastructure, which constitute the power lines.

It provides power reticulation only to approved housing projects and customers should ensure that the projects they are involved in have approved plans by the respective councils.

Zesa has been working on projects aimed at expanding electricity generation to bridge the gap between supply and demand. These include expansion of Kariba Power Hydro Station, Hwange Thermal Power Station and rehabilitation of small thermal stations.

Zesa is also working on emergency power plants and solar projects to improve power availability. Zimbabwe is facing a deficit of 400 MW against a peak demand of 1 400MW.

Mr Gwasira said Zesa is now also focusing attention to the national grid where a lot of cables, which are now faulting and carrying loads which are far more than they were designed for.

For instance, all infill housing projects were not catered for in the original design specification.