South Sudan’s MoU with Ethiopia, Uganda for power transmission to border areas

South Sudan is planning to implement bilateral agreements with Ethiopia and Uganda on the transmission of power to its border areas. The aim of agreement is to enhance economic recovery efforts.

South Sudan’s Energy and Dams Minister, Dhieu Mathok revealed to the journalists in Juba on Tuesday that they had an agreement with Uganda to connect the border towns of Kaya, Nimule and Kajo Keji. A plan to have transmission of electricity from the 600 Megawatt Karuma dam in Uganda is also being finalized in the agreement. Mathok said that the electricity transmission line from Karuma to Nimule-Juba is being funded by the African Development Bank.

“We signed the MoU [Memorandum of Understanding] and translated it into bilateral agreement and we are now supposed to sign the power-purchase agreement because Uganda said that they will take responsibility for the costs but they will recover their money from the collection,” said Mathok.

African Development Bank (AfDB) provided money for feasibility studies, and according to Mathok, now they are giving efforts in finding a company to accomplish the feasibility studies and then look for a company which can work on the transmission-construction work from Nimule to Junba. He also said they are looking for investors to fund five major hydropower projects, which include the Fula Rapids 42 megawatt, Grand Fula 890 megawatt, Shukolli 230 megawatt, Lakki 410 megawatt and Bedden 570 megawatt.

“When we have the feasibility studies it is very easy for us to sell them then we can be able to get the investors because people are asking about it,” he said. “We have a lot of potential in South Sudan in terms of energy, electricity and this idea of East Africa power pool which is being created by the East African countries will make us to dominate this sector because in terms of hydro-power we are really very advanced,” he added.

South had signed an agreement with Ethiopia in Addis Ababa in 2017 on the development of roads and electricity. On this, the minister said that they are following up on the agreement signed with Ethiopia. This, what he said, will see electricity transmitted from Ethiopia to the border areas like western upper Nile, Jonglei, Akobo and Pagak. He further revealed that a discussion with Sahara Power Group to develop the 530 megawatt power plant in the Tharjath oil field. The Nigeria-based group had already signed an agreement with South Sudan government’s ministry of energy and dams in November 2018 with an objective to support the generation, transmission and distribution of power.

Also Read: Harare’s water crisis - Urgent need of creating dams, 11 different chemicals needed