By Ziyah News Reporter
Harare– Struggling power utility, Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (ZESA) is owed 5.7 billion ZIG in unpaid bills headlined by industry contributing 50% of the debt owed to the parastatal.
ZESA is faced with a myriad of challenges including but not limited to ageing infrastructure, inability to service its own debt and the huge debt cannot be absolved from contributing to the problems at the power utility.
At the moment, the country is blighted by shortage of power and load shedding is the order of the day. Domestic users bear the brunt of loadsheding more as commercial and Industrial users are prioritised. The paradox though is that domestic users who carry the most burden out of power shortages, only 1% of the total debt owed to ZESA.
ZESA has been so lenient with industry and no wonder why at the peak of power shortages in 2022, they shot down a proposal by ZESA chairman Sydney Gata for them to import their power directly from regional peers, they knew they are benefitting from the tolerance of ZESA whom they are clearly giving the short end of the stick. From sub optimum tariffs to non-payment, how does industry expect to get power from ZESA when they are not paying religiously especially against the backdrop of imports that augment local power production?
Minus investment into power stations to meet demand, ZESA’s abilities towards efficiency are hamstrung by people who want electricity but do not want to pay for it. It might be time for the power utility to switch off these huge debtors to send a statement and start charging commercially viable rates even to the ever mourning industry which want concessions but are not willing to play ball when it comes to paying.
