By Sylvester Samba.
As at end of June, 2021, the total amount owed by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA) for the consumption of electricity is Le251.77 billion. This was confirmed by the Management of the Electricity Distribution and Supply Authority (EDSA) at the on-going Budget discussion taking place at the Ministry of Finance.
The media, state and none state actors present at the discussion were informed that EDSA’s Board and Management have sought government support through the Ministry of Finance for the payment of all monies owed to them by MDAs.
In response to this, representatives of Civil Society Organisations present appealed to the MDAs concerned to find ways to settle the debt they owe EDSA. According to them, with the absence of such huge amount of money EDSA would be unable to expand not only their network to ‘dark spot’ areas but to also to provide electricity to their consumers.
“The Authority continues to incur heavy losses in the sub-transmission and distribution of electricity, thereby seriously affecting its profitability and liquidity…Management will continue to implement its loss reduction strategies in order to improve the Authority’s financial performance”, EDSA noted.
They further explained that revenue collections continue to improve on a year-on-year basis, adding that monthly average collections have increased from Le29 Billion in 2018 to Le35 Billion in 2019. This, they maintained, has further increased to Le38 Billion in 2020 and Le42 Billion in 2021. “We expect the average collection to increase further to Le50 Billion in 2022”, EDSA assured.
