Left without light: a deadly wait for power in Addu

During the most recent round of power cuts across Addu's interconnected islands, Mayor Ali Nizar characterised the Fenaka Corporation's electricity service as a source of "harm". The public blames the state-owned utility's alleged negligence in providing electricity to the house where the couple died, he suggested. 

"There is no way the air wouldn't have become poisonous from running a small generator indoors, because the late Ibrahim Didi's pleas to have electricity connected to his home for two months went unanswered," the mayor wrote in a Facebook post.

Some people, however, pointed to personal responsibility in running a generator within a private residence. Didi's house was built in an area without an established electricity network, an informed source told the Maldives Independent. While laying out this network or contracting a party for the task is the responsibility of the state, the source stressed that stakeholders such as Fenaka should be consulted and informed ahead of time when plots of land are awarded for housing. The company could then be better prepared to cater to new residential neighbourhoods, he added.

The couple's death was the starkest consequence of a crisis that has persisted for more than a decade. There were power outages for 89 days over the past year, MP Ahmed Azaan, who represents the Central Hithadhoo constituency, said at a parliament committee meeting in late October.

In the country's second largest population hub, thousands continue to live with uncertainty over uninterrupted electricity – a constitutionally guaranteed fundamental right of every Maldivian citizen, and a responsibility the government has placed upon Fenaka.

"I have a baby with severe eczema. We have had flareups back to back due to the power cuts [...] only a person who goes through it or a mother who has to console a child with persistent uncontrollable itching can understand it," said Sajuwa, an Addu City resident, explaining both the physical toll and mental stress her family has to endure.

A sustainable solution has yet to materialise despite efforts that span multiple governments.

Earlier this year, a senior official at Addu's Fenaka office blamed the deteriorated electrical capacity on the "lack of proper spare parts, the absence of preventative maintenance and underutilisation of generators."

A central powerhouse serves the linked islands of Hithadhoo, Maradhoo, Maradhoo-Feydhoo, Feydhoo, and Gan in the southernmost atoll. The state of the existing powerhouse in Hithadhoo is a testament to the ongoing crisis. Some generators are placed within the facility's yard due to lack of space.

"Staff get worn out," a source told the Maldives Independent. Many small generators entail a higher workload to maintain the machines. Smaller generators also mean additional costs since each generator has to be serviced on regular intervals.

At the start of November, there were 20 generators for the connected islands, of which seven were not operational. Some of these had been rendered permanently unusable. Those in operation also have reduced efficiency, including some generators that provide an output of less than 50 percent.

Two more generators were installed since the beginning of November as temporary measures to meet the growing electricity needs. However, during his most recent visit to Addu City in early November, President Dr Mohamed Muizzu acknowledged that this was not a permanent fix.

Addressing residents of the four connected islands on November 5, Muizzu said that small fixes would not suffice. "We have brought about eight gen sets to date. However, a satisfactory solution has still not been found for this," he said.

Muizzu pledged to carry out a project to boost Addu City's power capacity to 30 megawatts – the same promise he made ahead of the 2024 parliamentary elections. 

In April 2024, Fenaka contracted China's DEC Dongfeng Electric Machinery to build a new 32-megawatt powerhouse with the capacity to be upgraded to a 50 megawatt plant.

The president was referring to a different project, MP Azaan from the ruling People's National Congress told the Maldives Independent.

It is unclear why the Dongfeng project fell through. Azaan suggested the problem might have been challenges in borrowing from China for a contractor finance project.

Last month, Fenaka's Managing Director Mohamed Najah told parliament's public accounts committee that the Addu power project would be awarded to a new contractor.

Najah told the state-owned enterprises committee on Tuesday that Fenaka is trying to increase Addu's capacity from 12 megawatts at present to 17 megawatts by next Ramadan, accusing the previous government of failing to undertake adequate efforts towards a permanent solution.

Of 14 generators sent to Addu by the previous administration between 2019 and 2023, all except two were broken, he claimed. The current administration has spent MVR 16 million (US$ 1 million) to repair these generators, he added. 

Both the scrapped Dongfeng project and the new one in the pipeline were announced despite a partially-built new powerhouse within the premises of the existing Hithadhoo powerhouse, a project commissioned during the previous administration.

But a senior Fenaka source told the Maldives Independent that this building would not be able to accommodate the generators needed for a long-term solution to Addu's power supply. The roofs are too low for the taller, high capacity generators, the official explained. Proper consultation had not been sought when the building was designed, he added.

Addu City also has a fully functional 1.5 megawatt waste-to-energy facility managed by the Waste Management Corporation. But this facility is not in use. If it were fully operational, the facility would be able to supplement one megawatt to the city's energy grid, a source from the state-owned-company told the Maldives Independent.

However, Addu does not have the required material due to the company's inability to sort waste, the source explained. Staff are yet to be adequately trained and Addu does not generate enough waste to continuously run the machine even if WAMCO could sort the waste it collects, he added. The solution would be to collect and transport waste from neighbouring atolls, he suggested.

In the meantime, peak electricity demand sits at around 12 megawatts. But proposed and ongoing projects that are expected to be completed within the next five years are likely to hike demand to 25 or 30 megawatts in the coming years, a source explained.

This means demand could double. But the proposed fix is a 30-megawatt plant that might barely cover it, with no confirmed capacity to grow. Addu has heard such promises before.