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Thank you. I would like to thank NAPE for inviting me to attend today’s meeting. I work with International Rivers, and was invited today to observe this gathering here in Uganda. International Rivers has been working for 20 years with NGOs and dam affected communities in the South to amplify the voices of those who bear the true cost of dams. International Rivers is not out to stop development. Rather, we work with local groups to ensure that development planning includes the voices of civil society and affected communities, which results in more sustainable, better–planned projects that s

After months of preparing to come to Ghana to continue with a research on hippopotamus and crocodile populations at the Bui National Park, where a 400 Mw hydropower Dam is to be constructed, Mr. Daniel Bennett, a biologist from the University of Aberdeen in Great Britain is now vowing never to return to this country. This follows a recent decision by Mr. Nick Ankudey, Director of the Wildlife Division of the Forestry Commission in Ghana abrogating a long standing agreement between them and asking Mr. Bennett not to set foot into the Bui National Park and surrounding villages to continue wi

The Lower Kihansi hydropower project on the Kihansi River in Tanzania is causing significant environmental damage, a newly released World Bank report reveals. The Bank's Environmental Review states that the project is destroying a unique ecosystem and eradicating several endemic species. The report is causing worries among project donors, who fear the project may violate their own guidelines, as well as the international Convention on Biological Diversity. The Tanzania Country Director of the World Bank, in cooperation with the Africa Region Environment Group, decided to carry out an environme

1. The projectThe Manantali project consists of the Manantali dam on the Bafing river, a tributary of the Senegal river, a 200 MW power station and a network of 1300 km of transmission lines to the capitals of Mali (Bamako), Mauritania (Nouakschott) and Senegal (Dakar). The dam is 1460 meters long and 65 meters high. It created a reservoir with a storage capacity of 11.3 billion m³ and a surface area of 477 km². In 1972, the governments of Mali, Mauritania and Senegal set up the Organisation pour la Mise en Valeur du Fleuve Senegal (OMVS) in order to promote irrigation, power generation a

Concerning About 30,000 people in the Brong–Ahafo–Region, Northwest Ghana, are threatened with losing their land and the right to feed oneself due to the construction of the hydroelectricity Bui–dam. Background With the construction of Ghana's third hydroelectricity dam, a population of approximately 30,000 people have to fear relocation or a decline in essential fishing grounds as well as an increase in dangerous diseases. The country's first hydroelectricity dam, the Akosombo–dam in Southeast Ghana, was built in 1966. The disastrous consequences of unfair compens

I was given the opportunity to take part in the work of the World Commission on Dams, by contributing to the Thematic Review on Social Impacts of Large Dams. In speaking of dams in Africa, I naturally concentrated on what I know best: the dams on the Senegal River, the chief of which is Manantali Dam, constructed under the aegis of the Organisation pour la Mise en Valeur du Fleuve Sénégal (OMVS), and the associated irrigation schemes on the Senegalese bank of the river, overseen by the State development corporation for the river, the Société d'Amánagement et d'Exploitation des terres du D

BackgroundSondu Miriu River, one of the six major rivers in the Lake Victoria basin, drains a total area of 3470 kilometre2 in the Western part of Kenya. The river originates from the western slopes of the Mau Escarpment and flows through a narrow gorge, penetrating the Nyakach Escarpment. It then meanders into the Odino falls before entering the flood plains of Nyakwere where it drains into the Winam Gulf of Lake Victoria. Sondu Miriu HEP Project is located about 400 kilometres from the capital city of Nairobi. It covers six sub locations with a population density of 500 people per square kil

The Bujagali Dam project is now being revived by the Ugandan government, in partnership with the Aga Khan’s Industrial Promotion Services, which recently signed a "power purchase agreement" on the project. This advisory, by the Ugandan NGO National Association of Professional Environmentalits, describes why this project should not go forward as is. Uganda Over the Signing of the Recent Bujagali Power Purchase As you are already aware, the government of Uganda on 13th December this year again signed the Bujagali Dam project deal with a consortium led by Industrial Promotions Services (IPS) o

The following are our key concerns over the Bujagali Dam project in Uganda. THE BUJAGALI PROJECT UNDER THE NEW DEVELOPER, IPS GROUP OF KENYA IS MOVING FORWARD BASED ON THE OUTDATED AND INCOMPLETE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT (EIA) PRODUCED BY THE PREVIOUS DEVELOPER.According to Uganda government and the World Bank, the Bujagali project is moving ahead. Government has already tendered the project and a sponsor has been selected, the Industrial Promotions Services (IPS) of Aga Khan Foundation. The IPS is known to have set up a consortium of contractors to build the project. Government and the

Uganda is one of the world’s poorest countries. About 95% of the population does not have access to electricity, and most could not afford it even if they were offered free connections to the national grid. The US–based AES corporation, the world’s largest independent power producer, proposes to construct a US$530–million hydroelectric dam that would drown Bujagali Falls on the Nile River, a culturally significant site that also supports a growing whitewater tourism industry. The project is now being considered for funding from the IFC, the World Bank, the US agency OPIC, and a number