The Senegal Minister of Petroleum and Gas (Ministre du pètrole et des Energies) on Tuesday January 26th, 2021 shared their energy reformation experience with the Sierra Leone’s MCC delegation.
The Hon Vice-president Dr. Mohamed Juldeh Jalloh who led the delegation explained the purpose of their visit to the Minister of Petroleum and Gas. He said they were there to gain an understanding of Senegal’s compact development process including the analysis and consultation phase.
Congratulating Sierra Leone for its MCC Compact qualification, Sophie Gladima, Ministrè du Pètrols et des Energies underlined essentially the principal objective of Senegal was to have universal energy by 2025. She stated that Senegal prioritized their MCC compact funding on energy.
She revealed that the provision of energy and renewable energy was important to boost economic development in the country and for the mining sector.
The Secrètaire Permanent à l’ Energie who is also the Senegal Focal Person for the MCC- Mr. Bakary Diop shared that when Senegal got the MCC Compact, they focused on energy looking at reforming the sector to enable it catch up with speed to meet the demands. He said they also looked at policy reforms, modernization and evacuation of electricity as well as taking into consideration universal access ensuring poor families to have electricity.
He further elucidated that when Senegal became eligible for the MCC, their President established a special unit to coordinate activities under the program and also undertook wide range of consultations.
The Sierra Leone’s Minister of Finance, Jacob Jusu Saffa was keen to know how Senegal managed the role of the private sector in electricity generation and distribution during their implementation stage.
Mr. Diop explained that they had to involve the private sector during their implementation process and shared lessons learnt. He said they had several IPP providers and they took into consideration security and guarantee for the number of years they would provide the services. He prefered that with lessons learnt from the BOT( Build- Operate- Transfer) where the provider would give a service for like 15- years and at the time the equipments are returned to the state, it was in bad shape. In that case, he said Senegal had a bad experience with the BOT system so they would prefer where the service provider would be given a contract for a specific number of years.
Sierra Leone’s Energy Minister, Alhaji Kanja Sesay was also keen for experiences to be shared how on Senegal went on or are going with their rural electrification and the capacity generated so far.
Issa Dione, Chief of thé cabinet responded that Senegal uses 1,400 megawatt with 76% of access in the country and above 50% rural electrification. The delegation will go into technical analysis on Wednesday 27th, January 2021.
Ishmael Bayoh
Information Attachè
Sierra Leone Embassy in Dakar, Senegal
