NYASALAND HYDRO SCHEME STARTED

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30471, 19 June 1964, Page 16

NYASALAND HYDRO SCHEME STARTED

(H.Z.P.A.-Reuter) BLANTYRE (Nyasaland). Work has begun on the £2,450,000 Nkula Falls hydro-electric scheme in Nyasaland. The falls are a horseshoe series of rapids about 35 miles north-west of Blantyre.

British, French and Swiss firms are helping local firms in the project, which has been aided by a sterling loan agreement with Britain. The power station is expected to start supplying electricity in 1966.

Most of the major contracts have been awarded. When completed the scheme should provide enough electricity to satisfy Nyasaland's requirements for the next 10 to 15years.

The project was the centre of political controversy two years ago when Dr. Hastings Banda, now the Prime Minister, who was then the Minister of Natural Resources, refused to allow the Government of the Rhodesia-Nyasa-land Federation to go ahead with the dam.

A fierce opponent of the now defunct federation. Dr. Banda had said that he would rather see Nyasaland “starve to death” than accept “charity” from the Federal Government, which originally intended to finance the scheme. But Dr. Banda later succeeded in gaining for Nyasaland the right to secede from the federation. The scheme is now financed directly by Britain.

The main contract, worth £862,706, has been awarded to the British firm, W. and C, French, who have also been given a £350,000 barrage contract at Liwonde, a few miles above the falls., French interests have been awarded a £512,706 contract covering the new power station, intake works, surge tower and sub-station. The Northern Rhodesian company, International Construction, has just started work on a tunnel 4000 ft long and 14ft in diameter. Their contract was worth £498,880. The Swiss firm, BrownBoveri won the £24,375 contract to supply remote-control gear to control the station from Blantyre, and English Electric are to provide transformers for £62,906. The general manager of the Nyasaland Electricity Supply

Commission, Mr R. S. Arnott, said that Blantyre thermal pow-er station, boosted by extra supplies of coal Imported from Southern Rhodesia, would produce enough electricity for the country until the new scheme became operational. Previously the station used coal from Mozambique. Access roads to the Nkula falls site have , already been completed, and a bridge across the river has been built, while work on the nearby Liwonde barrage is “progressing satisfactorily," said Sir Arnott.