SG PRESIDES OVER EAPP MINISTERIAL SESSION IN ARUSHA

Amb. Liberat Mfumukeko; EAC Secretary General giving his opening remarks at the 12th Council of Ministers opening session.

The Secretary General of the East African Community, Amb. Liberat Mfumukeko, over the weekend presided over the Ministerial Session of the 12^th Council of Ministers Meeting of the Eastern Africa Power Pool (EAPP).

The Ministerial Session was attended by five Ministers: Dr. Eng. Seleshi Bekele (Minister of Water Irrigation and Electricity, Ethiopia); Eng. Tarek El Molla (Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Egypt); Hon. Dr. Tabitha Boutros (Minister of State for Electricity and Dams, Sudan), Eng. Irene Muloni (Minister of Energy and Mineral Development, Uganda), and; Prof. Sospeter Muhongo (Minister for Energy and Minerals, Tanzania), who also chaired the Ministerial Session.

Prof. Sospeter Muhongo, Minister for Energy and Minerals, Tanzania, who also chaired the Ministerial Session while officially opening the Ministerial Session thanked the Ministers for their continued support and commitment to the EAPP project.

In his remarks, EAC Secretary General Amb. Mfumukeko emphasized the importance of the EAPP in contributing to socio-economic growth in East Africa.

“The provision of adequate, reliable, affordable and sustainable energy services is a key priority area in our energy sector for realizing the vision we have for East Africa as well as electricity interconnectivity across borders to promote the broader EAC objective of attracting investment and promoting competitiveness and trade,” he said.

Amb. Liberat urged EAPP to engage with the EAC Secretariat and its Partner States in the formulation of the 10-year Strategic Action Plan which will address the underlying challenges within the energy sector across the region.

EAPP’s main objective is to optimize development of energy resources in the region and to ease the access to electricity power supply to all citizens of the countries in the Eastern Africa Region through the regional power interconnections.

Member countries of the region have actively been implementing power generation and transmission projects. Most of the interconnection projects are now progressing so fast that before 2020 all of EAPP's members, except Libya and Egypt, will be interconnected by power exchange (trade). Libya and Egypt are already connected but the proposed link between Egypt and Sudan is now at feasibility study stage.

Present at the meeting were senior officers from the member countries’ energy sectors, Independent Regulatory Board members and Development Partners including the World Bank, Power Africa, Sweden, African Development Bank, Norway and China.

The participants engaged in discussions around Bilateral Trading Platforms which is part of EAPP’s future prospects. This will make it easier to enter into short term bi-lateral trades between EAPP members and EAPP members and non-EAPP members that they are interconnected with. It also aspires to facilitate the trading of electrical products (energy, capacity, reserves) and transportation (transmission).

Members of the Steering Committee, energy stakeholders and partners present at the meeting also discussed the status of the EAPP Interconnection Code Compliance Program, considered priority areas for mobilization of funds and explored renewable energy resources development and alternative transmission financing modalities.

As part of the milestones EAPP has so far achieved is development of a detailed Process and Principles documents that provides a step by step stakeholder process (simulates regulatory process) and technical guidance. This is to support transmission of firm power sale from Ethiopia to Tanzania (200 MWs) for 20 years.

At the closing session, Prof. Muhongo cited that EAPP was also looking to standardize willing charges among its member states in order to facilitate smooth exchange of power within the region. He also handed the over Chairmanship to Eng. Irene Muloni, Uganda’s Minister of Energy and Mineral Development who will chair the Council of Ministers for the next year.