Despite citizens’ outcry over the spate of blackouts over the weekend and the last two days, the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) is yet to give an explanation for the problem which has been plaguing residents all around the country for months.
Over the weekend, Monday and Tuesday, residents around Georgetown and parts of the East Bank and East Coast of Demerara were affected by power outages throughout each day.
Citizens took to social media to vent their frustration at the continued subpar service provided by the power company. Persons dubbed the Company as ‘GPHELL’ and likened their service to that of one which is nonexistent. Persons said that they were “fed up with having to beg for light” and quality service.
When Stabroek News visited the Company’s corporate office yesterday, it was informed by the Public Relations Department that a statement would be issued shortly and that no official was available to give a comment since they were currently in a board meeting. Up to press time the statement had not been released.
Despite the company’s annual general maintenance exercise which saw sections of the country being without power for more than six hours at different intervals, the problem continues to persist, without any indication of positive change.
Questions have been raised as to whether the scheduled maintenance had had any positive effect on the company’s infrastructure, since some say that the frequency of blackouts has increased since the general work had been performed.
Persons have also questioned whether the reasons the company provides for the outages are true, or whether they are facing a more serious issue which they are refusing to admit.
Jason Holder, a resident of Alexander Village, told Stabroek News, “This is just ridiculous at this point in time. I got blackout this morning while I was trying to iron my clothes to go to work. I was not able to start ironing them because of how sudden the blackout came and what happened? I had to go to work looking like a mess,” the man related, while adding that he is “totally fed up of GPL.”
“There are no words to describe them at this moment. People just fed up, fed up with what’s going on. Almost every week is some blackout and they always talking about doing this maintenance and that maintenance, and nothing seems to be changing. It seems like they just getting worse by the day,” another resident lamented.
He added that one of his relatives was in a situation once, where there was an outage, and when the power returned, an electronic device exploded.
Other persons and business owners expressed their disgust at the current state of the company and explained that it “constantly causes inconveniences.”
“You does can’t stay in your house when you get blackout because the place does be so hot. Plus when it stay off long, all your meat and stuff does spoil in the fridge. It’s really bad, and just coming and going, and coming and going, without no hint that it gon stop. Something needs to be done, it has to be a serious issue,” another person added.
