‘BVIEC should pay for damage’ – Businessman
A few days ago Minister responsible for the BVIEC Honourable Mark H. Vanterpool, Minister for Communications and Works, issued a statement via the Government Information Services apologizing to residents for the spate of power outages.
“Over the past two weeks, the Territory has suffered some power outages, which have resulted in load shedding being implemented. As Minister for Communications and Works, with responsibility for the BVI Electricity Corporation, BVIEC, I find it necessary to report at this time on the issues which have led to the recent disruption of the Territory’s power supply,” state the Minister.
But for some residents and business persons that statement came way too late. “Come on two weeks after you (Hon. Vanterpool) find it necessary to come forward with an explanation, not one week, TWO weeks later, when people pumps, appliances and such like get damage but the constant off and on, these people in this administration have no regards for [their] own, they just care about their image to the outside world,” said one businessman who asked not to be named.
“In this place you can’t be the type of friend to comfortably tell a friend when he is wrong or he casts you aside especially if he holding high office,” explained the man.
But Ms Jenette Rose-Blyden had no difficulty in stating her name as she said she had cause to delve into her pockets to assist her relatives in replacing water pump, TV set and a kitchen appliance. “The company should be made to compensate people for these things but you’ll die waiting for that or spend more than their actual cost on lawyer to take them to court, they just don’t care,” stated Ms Rose-Blyden.
One other resident who requested to be referred to by his call name ‘Crease’ said that he made several calls to the BVIEC seeking some answers about the constant outages but got no honest response. “All they would tell you is ‘sir the power will be back soon’ and soon for them is more than an hour,” alleged the man.
Similarly, valiant efforts by this news site to get a comment on the issue from the Management of BVIEC were futile.
“They say all kinds of things when we turn to VINO but everybody else just tells the glory side of things… Is only VINO got the [guts] to tell both sides so we will have to keep coming to VINO,” added Crease.
In the Release by Hon. Vanterpool he said that General Manager of the BVIEC, Mr. Leroy A. E. Abraham, has reported that they have had failures to Unit generators numbers six; eight and nine at different times, and the Corporation has developed a plan of action to repair these units and bring them back on line as soon as possible.
“The damage suffered to Unit nine was most severe and this Unit will require a complete rebuild, which will take several months before it can be brought back on line. The damage suffered to Unit six was less. The repairs to this Unit are underway, which should result in the Unit being returned to service within eight weeks or so. I am pleased to advise that at this time, Unit eight was successfully returned to service on Wednesday 20th August, following repairs,” he further noted.
Hon Vanterpool said that the installed generating capacity of the BVI Electricity Corporation is 39 megawatts. “With two of the largest Units, totaling 11 megawatts out of service, the Corporation has been unable to meet peak demand of approximately 30.5 megawatts. With Unit 8 back in service, the BVIEC now has approximately 33 megawatts of generating capacity, to supply a peak demand of 30.5 megawatts,” the release quotes Hon Vanterpool as saying.
“Since the opening of the tenders, the Board and management of BVIEC, along their consultants, have been evaluating these tenders and holding discussions with the potential contractors, to ensure that the Territory obtains value for money from this very important project,” said Hon Vanterpool.
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22 Responses to “‘BVIEC should pay for damage’ – Businessman”
although it is under his ministry.for him to come out and apoligize is micro management
then he should go and run the corp himself for the manager is not.