Afternoon of joy, evening of darkness: Opiyo Wandayi's blackout nightmare begins
Cabinet Secretary Energy and Petroleum Opiyo Wandayi when he appeared before the Committee on Appointments at the County Hall Nairobi on August 3, 2024.
What you need to know:
- Friday's blackout is one of the many blackouts the country has witnessed in recent days.
- The outage affected most parts of the country except North Rift and sections of Western.
On a day when President William Ruto graced the homecoming ceremony of the new Energy Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi in Siaya, Kenyans were plunged into darkness following a nationwide blackout in the twilight.
Kenya Power Company confirmed the “widespread power outage” that saw Kenyans stay in the dark for hours. This is one of the many blackouts that the country has witnessed in recent days.
“We have lost power supply to various parts of the country,” Kenya Power said on Friday night, before announcing restoration before midnight.
The outage affected most parts of the country except North Rift and sections of Western.
The nationwide blackouts are almost always as a result of loss of bulk power supply and disturbance on the grid.
“Please be advised that we've lost bulk 66kV supply affecting all the feeders. Kindly be patient as restoration is underway,” said in November 2023 when a similar occurrence happened.
The first incident of power outage occurred on August 25, 2023, with Kenya Power and Turkana wind firm blaming each other over the incident.
The second incident on December 10 plunged the country, without sparing critical infrastructures like Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA), into hours-long darkness.
In May this year, another incident, like last night’s, hit most counties, with Kenya Power attributing the reason to a system fault.
A year ago, when the country experienced nationwide blackout, the then energy CS Davis Chirchir endeavoured to explain the power outage. He took journalists on a tour Kenya Power’s monitoring plant in In Nairobi’s Dandora estate.
The JKIA suffered immensely because the backup generators failed to start. Online videos showed travellers huddling around the main terminal at the JKIA in darkness, while some used mobile phone torches to light their way.
Following the widespread electricity blackout, Mr Kipchumba Murkomen, now the Sports CS, who was the Transport CS at the time, apologised to Kenyans who were affected by the darkness. He also fired and reshuffled the Kenya Civil Aviation Authority (KCAA) bosses.
Mr Wandayi, who at the time was the opposition minority leader in the National Assembly, termed the intermittent blackouts a show of “incompetence” and “a scandal which requires heads to roll.”
He also called for a need to investigate and establish whatever was happening at the utility firm resulting in frequent countrywide blackouts.
“Frequent nationwide power outages not only exposes KPLC incompetence, but also compromises national security while denting economic production,” posted Mr Wandayi on X on August 23.
“It is a scandal which requires heads to roll but more importantly there is need to establish what is happening at KPLC which continues to enjoy a long monopoly but does not give value for taxpayers money.”
Several months later, following the formation of a broad-based government, Mr Wandayi became the Energy CS. And now, whether the heads will roll given that he is in charge is a waiting game?
Mr Wandayi, the former Ugunja MP, told Nation that the ministry was on top of things and was “alert.”
“This particular blackout was a technical hitch in the grid which was responded to swiftly by our engineers,” Wandayi said.
“We are alert. We’re committed to addressing current and emerging challenges within the sector,” he went on.
Mr Wandayi also said he is departing Saturday August 31 night for Bali, Indonesia for a two-day Africa-Indonesia summit that will deliberate on energy matters and will give insights on how address emerging issues in the sector.
For a man fondly known to his ex-constituents as “intellectual”, and who now is at the helm of the Ministry of Energy, an afternoon of delight and an evening of darkness could not just be a first/mockery. It is a litmus test to his leadership and ability to steer the country of what has become frequent – nationwide power outages – and what he initially termed as “incompetence”.
During his vetting, Mr Wandayi outlined an elaborate plan of how he intended to solve the frequent nationwide protests.
In his grand plans to panacea the troubled sector, he explained that he intended to fast-track the development of transmission lines to ultimately solve the issue of blackouts that has been prevalent across the country in the past year.
He promised to “ensure the Turkwel-Ortum-Kitale line is completed and commissioned in the shortest time. That will deal with power issues in Pokot, Kitale and other areas.
The Kisumu-Kakamega-Musaga line must also be completed, similarly the Narok-Bomet line has to be completed."
"I have already engaged officers informally in the ministry and if I'm approved, I am going to fast-track the development of transmission lines with the requisite capacity to evacuate power and take it to consumers, not only in Western Kenya but across the country," Mr Wandayi explained during his vetting.
He is barely a month old in office and the nightmare of the previous office holder has caught up with him.
