- Kenyatta administration fails to drive down electricity tariffs
- Prepaid tariffs recorded a marginal increase
Contrary to promises by the administration of President Uhuru Kenyatta, electricity tariffs have marginally increased. President Kenyatta has promised to reduce the cost of electricity progressively over a three-month period, from October to December.
According to investigations by an online newspaper, the Nation, electricity tariffs for prepaid customers rose by at least 3.33% for the same period. As a result, electricity tariffs rose from KSh17.86 per unit to KSh18.5 per unit between October and December.
“So far what we have witnessed has been the reorganisations and reforms happening within government agencies involved in energy such as Kenya Power and Kenya Electricity Transmission Company (Ketraco) as well as steps for renegotiation of Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) that made power costly,” said the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Kenyan Association of Manufacturers (KAM), Phyllis Wakiaga.
“So far, we have not seen costs coming down, but we believe that the activities we have seen happening recently are geared towards achieving that,” she added.
A Presidential Task Force investigation into the high costs of electricity found that the state-owned utility, Kenya Power, had entered into several expensive and uncompetitive Power Purchase Agreements (PPA) with Independent Power Producers (IPPs).