By
Fatik al-Rodaini
SANA'A:
March 26, 2012- Over more than a year of protests
and consequent political crisis in the Arabian Peninsula millions of
Yemeni people all over the country badly suffered of continued cutting
electricity power of up to more than 20
hours a day.
During that time Yemeni government continued
promising its citizens of completely solving the situation. However, the
ongoing lack of electricity provoked anger among Yemenis who lost their
confidence in the government after repeated, failed promises that the situation
it would be resolved.
Yemenis have to contend with power cuts that
have become a daily occurrence since the protests. "I became familiar with
this situation, after more than a year of cutting power," a resident
living in the Yemeni capital Sana'a told Bikyamasr.com.
Last month Yemeni Electricity Ministry, Saleh
Somea announced the fixing up of Marib’s Gas-Powered Generation Center after
being shut down for more than five months.
Actually, Yemenis enjoy from three to four days
of electricity, but suddenly all Yemenis surprised of the power off since that
time. '' We enjoy hours of electricity nowadays but I still afraid of being in
the darkness again," Ahmed Senan said.
Last year, Yemeni government blamed power
outages in Sana'a on attacks mounted by anti-Saleh tribesmen against
electricity grids. But the opposition accuses the government of deliberately
disrupting electricity supplies to distort the image of anti-Saleh forces.
"Despite
the trade accusations between Yemeni government and the opposition, citizens
are only the ones who suffer the absence of electricity. Most of the government
and the opposition leaders or officials have their own generators, thus they don't suffer the same
problem," Hamdan Raheem commented.
Last week, local newspaper reported that that
the manager of the Marib Gas Power Station, Abdul-Rahman Fatahi, was relieved
from his duties of running the station affairs.
"Fatahi was sacked from his position as
the manager of the Marib Electricity station, the biggest power station in the
country, and his deputy, Mohammed Sabolan, was appointed to replace him, the
newspaper said.
The decision came one day after the supply
lines were targeted yet again that the station had to completely halt its
operation, leaving thousands of households in the Yemeni capital of Sana'a deal
with the inconvenience caused by the lengthy power outages.
Even with replacing another manger the problem
is continued, on Friday morning Yemeni government said that the electricity
towers in Marib province were attacked by tribesmen belonging to Al Shabwan
tribe. Despite the interference of Yemeni army and entering in clashes with
tribesmen to handle the lack of electricity and returning the power to Yemeni
cities the problem is continued.
Yemenis solve the problem
Over the past year, Yemenis who could afford generators
spent thousands of rials buying fuel to power their homes. And despite the
power cuts, Yemenis continued to receive high electricity bills.
Despite the attempt by Yemenis to solve their
problem in their manners, they still facing different kinds of obstacles
besides.
As a part of their solution, many people have
bought electricity generators to get power,
however they face a shortage of diesel or oil.
"I have bought an electricity generator so
that I can do my job," Mohammed Hatem said. But he is facing another
problem: a shortage of diesel fuel necessary for operating his generator.
“Diesel
is not available in Sana'a. I have to go outside the capital to get it at
prices, which are at least twice as high as before,” he added.
''Before the eruption of the anti-Saleh
uprising the electricity supply was erratic but not as bad as it is now,'' a
residents in Sana'a said.
Yemenis lost their jobs
Many people lost their jobs because of the
problem of the electricity. "I closed my own workshop; I couldn’t pay my
workers, I couldn't meet orders from my customers as well," said Fateh
Hamir, who runs a smith workshop in Taiz.
A worker in a factory in Yemen's eastern
province of Hodeida said that his boss fired him along with others. "Our
boss fired us because he couldn't pay our salaries."
In the capital Sana'a, Rodha Mohssen, a
dressmaker told bikyamasr.com that she stopped receiving new orders, she cannot
obligate with the customers.
Several businesses were shut up due to the same
problem.
The residents of the Yemeni capital showed
their satisfaction with the firm step taken by the leadership to track and
pursue those responsible for targeting the basic services that they direly
need.
The recent attack took out Marib electricity
plant out of the system causing the loss of 400 Megawatt of power in addition
to financial damage. The station feeds about 60 percent of Yemen's cities.
Last month, the Ministry of Electricity
released a report on the difficulties it is facing.
It indicated that Yemen's General Electricity
Corporation has been suffering financial problems since the Gas-powered
Generation Station in Marib shut down five months ago.
The Minister of Electricity promised to solve
Yemen’s power cuts in December but continued attacks made this impossible.
In February, the cabinet ordered the Ministries
of Interior, Defense and Electricity to repair damaged power supply towers and
protect both the towers and stations from any further attacks.
The cabinet said that any attacks were seen as
banditry, ordering the Ministers of Interior and Defense to take strict legal
action against those involved.
As usual I'm doing my work while the
electricity is off, I depend on the electricity generator but it costs me a lot
of money.