UGANDA: Budget sorts power crisis

…The east African nation has suffered crippling electricity shortages for months. Residents in the capital Kampala receive power for just 24 of every 48 hours and almost every business has been forced to run costly, diesel-powered generators.

Under pressure to end the blackouts as quickly as possible, Suruma said the government had set aside sh202b to tackle the power crisis.

He said sh99b would be used to launch an energy fund tasked with building two hydropower dams on the Nile.

A further sh70b would be used to install more thermal generators in the capital Kampala. Suruma said the government would allow power generating and power distributing companies to defer loan repayments to the government worth sh$33b in 2006/07.