-pushes back against Opposition Leader’s claims
Minister of Public Utilities and Aviation Deodat Indar has rejected Opposition Leader Azruddin Mohamed’s criticism of the Government’s US$422 million transmission and substation project, insisting that the works are progressing and represent an unprecedented expansion of Guyana’s electricity infrastructure.
Indar, responding to Mohamed’s recent assessment of several substations, said the Opposition Leader lacked the experience to properly assess the scale and complexity of the infrastructure programme.
“Azruddin Mohamed does not know what he is speaking about. Azruddin Mohamed has no idea what it means to build out any major infrastructure,” Indar told Kiskadee Watch on Friday, describing Mohamed’s comments as “misplaced” and “misleading”, while accusing him of seeking to undermine public confidence in the project.
“These projects are ongoing; they are built by international companies. If anyone is to take a drive across this country, they will see the new infrastructure going up,” Indar contended.
According to him, the programme involves more than 380 kilometres of transmission infrastructure at 69 kilovolts (kV) and 230 kV, in addition to another 425 kilometres of 13.8 kV infrastructure. “That is an entire build out of the system. It is transformation; the country has never seen this kind of development before,” he said.
Indar noted that the substations being constructed as part of the programme are intended to support the transmission of electricity to communities across the coastland and improve the reliability of the national grid. “There’s no significant delay; the project is being currently executed,” he said.
He was responding to Mohamed’s video on Thursday in which the Opposition Leader visited the five substations at La Bonne Intention (LBI), Enmore, Trafalgar, Williamsburg and Number 53 and questioned the pace of construction.
Mohamed described the US$422 million project as the largest single investment in GPL’s history but said the substations were behind schedule and questioned whether they would deliver the promised improvements in electricity reliability. The project was formally launched in April 2025.
The contracts, awarded to PowerChina and Kalpataru Projects International Limited, cover major transmission works, five new substations and the upgrade of the existing Kingston Substation. The original scope included 155 kilometres of 230 kV double-circuit transmission lines and 167 kilometres of 69 kV double-circuit transmission lines.
At the time of the contract signing, Indar had said the projects were expected to be completed within one year and specifically told the contractors that “the timeline is one year”.
Mohamed, however, said during his recent site visits that three of the substations appeared to remain largely at the foundation stage, while limited piling had been undertaken at the other two. He questioned whether the June 2026 completion target had been met.
Recent Government and GPL updates have presented a different picture of progress. On September 14, the Department of Public Information reported that construction at the new substations at Chateau Margot and Enmore, along with the expansion of the Columbia Substation, was 60 per cent complete, with foundation works ongoing.
GPL has also said the US$422.2 million programme is intended to strengthen the national grid, increase capacity and improve reliability as Guyana prepares to integrate electricity from the 300-megawatt Gas-to-Energy project.
Indar’s defence of the project also comes in light of the Gas-to-Energy project where the government said earlier this month that the first gas turbine is scheduled to come online by the end of 2026, initially supplying about 57 megawatts to the national grid.
The transmission project is separate from the generation component of Gas-to-Energy, but the new grid infrastructure is being developed to facilitate the movement and distribution of additional electricity once generated at Wales.
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