Afghan social media users are reacting to a recent report that the Afghan government has signed an MoU with UAE-based company PAL 4 Solar Energy LLC for a solar power plant that reportedly will have the capacity to generate 3,000 megawatts of electricity.
The former CEO of Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat (DABS)–the country’s main power supplying company–has said that the Afghan government over the past 18 years has failed to sign even small capacity projects, and says a project for such a high volume of electricity is beyond the government’s capacity.
He said that even the government officials do not know whether the current transmission lines and the power system has the capacity to transmit such a large amount of electricity.
Social media users say that the UAE-based company has the capacity of generating only 6 megawatts of electricity, but it claims to generate 3,000 megawatts in Afghanistan.
“We hope that DABS is able to deliver on the promises it made to the people about the projects, I hope that this time the projects do not remain incomplete like the past,” said Mirwais Alimi, former head of DABS.
Last year the government and DABS announced that they were jointly working on a solar power project that would be able to generate 2,000 megawatts of electricity. However, until now the two sides have not managed to identity a place for it.
Experts say that the current power system of Afghanistan doesn’t have the capacity to handle 3,000 megawatts of power.
“Some circles want to create obstacles in the way of this investment, while this project is quite important for Afghanistan,” said Wahidullah Tawhidi, a spokesman for DABS.
Sources meanwhile told TOLOnews that previously the plan was for the offer of the UAE-based company to be referred to the High Economic Council, however–the sources said–it is not known why the contract was signed in a hasty manner.
