ZESA Holdings, Zimbabwe’s power utility, plans to end load-shedding by next year and provide electricity to everyone in the country by 2030.
In an exclusive interview with The Herald in Harare on Thursday, ZESA executive chairman Sydney Gata said the strategy includes boosting local manufacturing, forming international partnerships, and improving organisational efficiency.
Gata said big companies will now handle their own energy supply risks instead of relying on the government and ZESA. He said:
We decided that those customers we now describe as competent customers must fend for themselves, but we are assisting them.
Gata asserted that this year, ZESA began clearing the connections backlog, and by next year, load-shedding will come to an end. He added:
In 2026, the strategic plan is to clear the connections backlog. In 2027 the agenda is to end power imports, and target to be a net exporter of power by 2028.
The target for 2029 is to be a world-class power lighting country and ultimately achieve universal access to electricity by 2030.
There have been considerable investments. We now have captive power plant projects, they are six, which together add up to more than 1000MW that are being commenced, most of them in the next month.
We are doing the groundbreaking for three of them next month. They together will give us 2 690MW and our current dependable capacity hovers around 1500MW but quite often it can go as low as 1000MW.
Next year up to December 2025, we shall have commissioned at least six of these projects aggregating to an additional new capacity of 2 690MW which is almost double our current dependable capacity.
Gata said that another step the power company has taken to reduce currency risk is to manufacture all the equipment used in the electricity supply industry within the country. He said:
We have already commissioned an SPV that will manufacture cables and conductors. We need to replace some 24,000 kilometres of underground cable conductors in this country because they are old and rotten.
So, we engaged a UAE company with access to both capital and technology to manufacture conductors and cables in this country as ZESA Enterprises.
He said solving the power issue in the country isn’t a quick fix but involves a mix of solutions that will also help future generations.
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