BAGHDAD: The electricity ministry needs almost a tenth of Iraq's annual budget for debts and new projects to bring the limping power sector back on its feet, a senior official told AFP on Wednesday.Adel Mahdi, advisor to the electricity minister, also said that between 2012 and 2030 the ministry would need 3.85 billion dollars a year to rebuild the sector and keep up with growing demand.
"We are asking this year for $7.5 billion to pay $2.5 billion in short-term debts and to finance new projects," Mahdi said in an interview. "This year is an exception because of the debts. Starting next year we will need $3.85 billion annually for the next 20 years to rebuild the sector and keep up with demand, which is growing at about 10 percent.
"It is a lot of money but we have no choice," Mahdi said, noting the importance of fixing a sector devastated during the 2003 US-led invasion and by two decades of war and sanctions that preceded it.The amount that the ministry wants is nine percent of this year's draft budget, which estimates overall expenditure at $81.86 billion and income at $68.56 billion, leaving a shortfall of $13.3 billion.
Angry Iraqis staged violent demonstrations last summer in several southern cities over power rationing as temperatures reached 54 degrees Celsius (130 Fahrenheit).Homes and businesses across Iraq suffer daily power cuts and rely on private generators to fill the gap, as the war-ravaged country struggles to boost capacity.
Mahdi said he had been assured by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, who has set improving electricity provision as a priority, that the ministry would receive all or most of the money it was asking."Mr Maliki visited the ministry yesterday and I explained to him that if we want the electricity sector to be built effectively, the government must decide and dedicate and prioritise."He promised to be strongly behind our request, which of course must be submitted to parliament," Mahdi said.
Mahdi also explained to Maliki there was no short-term cure for boosting electricity supplies, and that Iraqis could not expect things to improve before 2013, when new projects in the pipeline would come on stream.
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