–with steady progress record despite remaining shortcomings, President Ali says

WHILE acknowledging that there have been improvements and lapses in relation to power generation in the country, President Dr Irfaan Ali has said that major investments are underway to transform the Guyana Power and Light’s (GPL) transmission and distribution network.
The Head of State made this known during an interview on Tuesday when he was asked about the performance of GPL.
Dr Ali said: “I can’t sit here and say that I have not recognised improvement also in GPL; it is not where we want it to be as yet.”
He went on to note that technical expertise has been brought in, but the reason that it is not where it should be is that the entire transmission network has to be done, and that is currently underway.
This, he noted, is an investment of close to some US$600 million to have this done. It is essentially the complete overhaul of a system where there was no real maintenance prior to 2020.
The Head of State, however, said: “We’re doing it at the same time whilst the growth in consumption and demand is moving at an exponential pace.”
To this end, Dr Ali said that the government has a plan to address production, transmission and even distribution.
“The tens of thousands of new homes that are coming on every two – three years to the grid on the same system… we now have to move at a rapid pace to have the cable across the Demerara River completed,” he said.
Dr Ali reiterated that on the power side, there have been improvements, but it is still not where they want it to be. There are still weaknesses in the management that are being addressed and challenges from distribution to production.
Th Head of State further noted that the government hopes that by the last quarter of 2026, the Gas-to-Energy project would be in a position to deliver, but that too would be a problem if the transmission and distribution are not completed, and as such, work will continue to progress on that.
“We are fixing and reinvesting in the entire infrastructure in energy while we have to keep the power on,” President Ali said.
In assuring citizens of the government’s commitment, he said: “I can say with great clarity that there is a massive investment in infrastructure, human development, capacity building, institutional changes that is onstream to give us a safe, efficient and highly reliable network.”