12 January 2008
Maputo — Electricity from the Cahora Bassa dam on the Zambezi began flowing to Zimbabwe again on Saturday, after the Zimbabwean power utility ZESA had paid off some of its debt.
The dam operating company, Hidroelectrica de Cahora Bassa (HCB) had demanded payment of 10 million US dollars out of a total ZESA debt of about 19 million dollars. When repeated promises to pay in December were not honoured, HCB threw the switches on 1 January, cutting off ZESA.
Juliao Pondeca, the advisor to the HCB board on strategic and commercial development, confirmed to AIM that the ten million dollars has now been paid and that electricity supplies to ZESA resumed at zero hours on Saturday.
He added that ZESA has also promised to pay off the remaining debt, and to honour the monthly bills from HCB. Pondeca was sure that these promises from ZESA had the backing of the Zimbabwean government.
HCB had clearly been irritated by ZESA's habit of promising to pay "tomorrow" - but when tomorrow arrived the only thing HCB received from ZESA was further promises, rather than money in its account.
According to Pondeca, before the 10 million dollar payment, ZESA's debt to HCB stood at 18.7 million dollars, and a further four million dollars would fall due by the end of January. HCB felt obliged to act because it did not want the Zimbabwean debt to balloon into something unsustainable.
Zimbabwe has traditionally relied on electricity imports to bridge the gap between what it generates (mostly at the Kariba south hydropower station and at the Hwange coal-fired station) and what it consumes.
But Zimbabwe's chronic shortage of foreign exchange, and the worthlessness of its own currency, have pushed ZESA into building up repeated debts, not only with HCB, but also with Zambian and Congolese suppliers. As for the South African electricity company, Eskom, not only has it demanded that ZESA pay upfront, but currently power shortages in South Africa itself prevent it from exporting electricity to Zimbabwe.
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