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Reports Lays Accent on Lesotho, Uganda Dams

by Nicodemus Odhiambo, Panafrican News Agency - 20 November 2000

Report Lays Accent On Lesotho, Uganda Dams

Panafrican News Agency,
November 20, 2000

Nicodemus Odhiambo
Dar es Salaam

For critics in Lesotho and Uganda, the recent report of the World Commission on Dams or WCD is likely to stir up further resistance to the construction of controversial dam projects in the two countries.

The report portrays the Lesotho Highlands Water Project and the proposed Bujagali Hydroelectric Dam project in Uganda as especially harmful.

It questions the social and environmental impacts of the projects and their justifiability on the basis of environmental implications as well their economic benefits.

The Lesotho Highlands Water Project or LHWP, Africa's largest infrastructure project, is a massive, multi-dam scheme built to divert water from Lesotho's Maloti Mountains to South Africa's industrial Gauteng Province.

The first phases of the World Bank-supported project involves the construction of three large dams which, when completed will dispossess more than 30,000 rural farmers of homes, fields, and grazing lands and deprive many of their livelihoods, according to the WCD report.

The project, the report says, poses serious threats to Lesotho's mountain river systems because of reduced flow rates and less-frequent floods.

Several endangered plant and animal species in the Senqu River basin or Orange River in South Africa "will be placed under severe strain and may entirely disappear from project areas," the report warns.

It raises similar overtures over the 530-million-US dollar Ugandan Bujagali project that seeks to drown Bujagali Falls on the River Nile.

The multi-million dollar project is to be funded by the US-based AES Corporation.

The project is now being considered for funding from the IFC, the World Bank, the US agency OPIC, and a number of European export credit agencies.

Critics in Uganda, including NGOs and civil society have raised a number of other concerns about the project, according to the report.

The existing grid to which the dam will supply electricity is very inefficient and only a fraction of the nation's population is connected to it, they say.

Allegations of corruption have meanwhile dogged the project, according to the WCD.

The project was not subject to competitive bidding and had therefore enjoyed undue favouritism from both the Ugandan and US governments. Bujagali is also a very risky project for Uganda, according to the report.

Concerns are raised as to whether Ugandans would enjoy the full utility of the project once it is done because the country had commitment to buy a set amount of power every year regardless of how much was actually produced.

Also environmental risks are high.

Scientists believe East Africa could be hit with increasing and more serious droughts due to global climate change, thus increasing the project's already significant "hydrological risk."

The project could interfere with the fish trade in Uganda, as the Victoria-Nile also is an extensive fishery resource with an estimated potential of 10,000 metric tonnes of fish per year.

Based on the findings and those from other parts of the globe, the WCD commission recommends that no dam should be built without the agreement of the affected people.

It also advises that mechanisms should be developed to provide social reparations for those who are suffering the impacts of dams, and to restore damaged ecosystems.

"Priority should be given to maximising the efficiency of existing water and energy systems before building any new projects, periodic participatory reviews should be done for existing dams to assess such issues as dam safety, and possible decommissioning," the report adds.

The WCD, an independent body, itself sponsored by the World Bank, to review the performance of large dams and make recommendations for future planning of water and energy projects, delivers its report in a rapidly changing international environment.

It debates about how to conserve the world's precious resource base while meeting the needs of growing populations hungry for economic progress abound.

Rapidly changing terms of investment, terms of trade, democratisation, the role of the state, the role of civil society, the obligation to protect threatened ecosystems and preserve Planet Earth for future generations all form part of its debates.

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