Ethiopia’s grand desire in 2011 to construct Africa’s biggest hydroelectric dam named the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam -GERD, on its share of the Blue Nile was finally got its first turbine commissioned to generate power.
Prime Minister of Ethiopia, His Excellency Abiy Ahmed while officially inaugurating the GERD mega-electricity production plant said the $4.2bn project expected to produce more than 5,000 megawatts of electricity is indeed good news for the continent as well as the downstream countries with whom it aspires to work harmoniously with.
Abiy while congratulating Ethiopians disclose that the 5,000 megawatts generated from the turbine will double the country’s electricity output, and bring light to 60 percent of the population suffering in darkness, saving the labour of the mothers who carry wood on their backs in order to get energy.
He also made it known that while the water from the Blue Nile is generating energy for electricity, it would not starve nor distort its flow into Sudan and Egypt as agreed in the documents signed between the three nations in 2015, prohibiting any of the parties from taking unilateral actions in the use of the river’s water.
97 percent of Egyptian‘s fear is that the GERD project would impede irrigation and drinking water that flows from the Blue Nile and the Sudanese sees the GERD dam project as succor that would help regulate its annual flooding but fears the dam construction could harm its own dams if a proper agreement on the GERD’s operation is not considered.
The Dam Project measuring 145-meter (475-foot), was initiated by former Prime Minister Meles Zenawi and lies on Blue Nile River in the Benishangul-Gumuz region of western Ethiopia, not far from the border with Sudan.
Abiy during the commissioning said it is the beginning of a new era for citizens added that the GERD would foster integration that would help overcome the economic crisis and facilitate political stability as well as improve the continent’s position in the global political economy
A prominent economist and activist, Dr. Peter Biar Ajak, said that the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) will serve as a powerful symbol of the African awakening and empowerment project.
