Uganda's Museveni blasts power dam critics
Date: 21-Jun-02
Country: KENYA
"Those who are saying World Bank should not give us money, like environmentalists, should know that it will be built, whether it is by the World Bank or ourselves," Museveni said at the opening of a business forum in the capital Kampala.
"Those who don't want the dam, do they think they are dealing with a bunch of fools or people who know what is good?" the Ugandan state-owned New Vision daily quoted him as saying.
The 250-megawatt project, described by economists as east Africa's largest commercial investment, is to be built by U.S. firm AES Corporation on the river Nile.
Environmentalists oppose the venture as it will submerge a series of rapids, affecting tourism and local cultural sites. The venture will also displace 94 households.
Museveni was responding to heightened speculation about the future of the project after the World Bank on Tuesday postponed a decision to approve $250 million in political risk guarantees.
AES had asked for the postponement to give the power company time to finalise negotiations with contractors on insurance.
"We requested the World Bank to delay the meeting to approve the political risk guarantee for the project becase we have had to renegotiate with the dam contractors," said Sara Birungi, spokeswoman of AES Corp's local unit AES Nile Power.
She said the September 11 attacks in the United States had thrown up additional insurance issues not catered for in the original contract and these had had to be resolved.
"We expect that within the next few weeks we should reach agreement," Birungi said by telephone from Kampala.
She said she was optimistic that once talks with the contractors were completed the World Bank would give the project the guarantees that would allow construction to start.
The consortium building the dam for AES, which will be the owner and operator of the project, is made up of Sweden's Skanska AB, Veidekke of Norway, Swedish-Swiss engineering firm ABB, U.S. General Electric and France's Alstom SA.
Kristian Mathismoen, an official of Veidekke, confirmed talks with AES were taking place but declined further comment.
The project at Bujagali, 80 km (50 miles) east of Kampala, was approved last year by the Ugandan government but the planned May 2002 start date has not been met due to the additional negotiations over insurance, officials say.
The additional power will help alleviate the country's electricity shortages, which official figures show lose Uganda up to 2.5 percentage points in annual growth. Only three percent of Uganda's 23 million population have access to electric power.