Energy CS Wandayi says special team set up to respond to power blackouts

The Ministry of Energy has announced its commitment to significantly reduce the occurrence of power outages nationwide.

The ministry says that it has rolled out comprehensive strategies aimed at tackling challenges bogging the sector, including high electricity costs, grid reliability, and poor consumer sentiment.

With the announcement coming days after the country experienced yet another national blackout, the ministry stated that it is working to reduce the frequency of these blackouts, with Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi even stating that the government has set up a special team to respond to blackouts in record time.

“There was a malfunction of one of our equipment at the Suswa substation,” said CS Wandayi on the recent blackout.

While the CS remained noncommittal on the exact measures to eradicate blackouts, he said the government is doing all it can to ensure that Kenyans enjoy a stable supply of power.

“I am not here to tell you that blackouts are a thing of the past. What I am here to tell you is that we have put in place measures and systems that would first and foremost mitigate the blackouts. But if they happen, there will be a system to respond swiftly to the blackout and restore power in the shortest time possible,” noted Wandayi.

“We are also continuing to invest in infrastructure, both at the generation level by KenGen and at the transmission level by KETRACO.”

Energy Principal Secretary Alex Wachira, speaking on what the government is doing to avert blackouts, said; “So overall, we have an excess of Ksh.64 billion that we are working with, and that is on infrastructure development alone.”

Citizen TV also sought to find out the impact of the constant scheduled power blackouts in different parts of the country.

“This is really in line with our very serious commitment to ensure that the quality of supply is going to be maintained. So when we do see that there are some leaning poles or some things that need to be undertaken, then we do issue them out because we do believe, as a very cardinal principle, that prevention, and it really works in energy, is really better than repairs,” Kenya Power CEO Joseph Siror noted.