By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

DEPUTY Prime Minister Philip Davis yesterday forecast that persistent electricity challenges will give way to affordable and efficient supply within the next six months as he urged Bahamians to continue to exercise patience with embattled service provider Bahamas Power & Light (BPL).

Notwithstanding public outrage over recent outages, Mr Davis, the Minister of Works, maintained that there has been “tremendous” improvement since the American company PowerSecure signed a five-year management services agreement with the former Bahamas Electricity Corporation last year.

He declined comment when asked when the government would publicly disclose the agreement, which officials have said is worth as much as $25m.

“We do appreciate the exasperation and I want the Bahamian public to continue to be patient with us,” Mr Davis said. “I think we ought to recognise that there has been tremendous improvement because lights are not off for any interminable amount of time.

“The problems are being identified quickly and being addressed just as quickly. The challenge as I’ve said is that we have a very aged infrastructure and it’s going to take time and capital to have them all replaced and back in service.

“So we are assiduously working. I think within the next six months you will see all what they are doing now will come to fruition and we will have a more affordable efficient energy company.”

Since taking the helm last February, PowerSecure’s efforts at restructuring the cash-strapped utility provider have been marred by island-wide power outages in the capital, and on some Family Islands.

Last week’s outage, which left some customers in western New Providence without power for more than 12 hours, was reportedly caused by equipment failure at the Windsor Field substation.

In a press statement released Friday, the company said the outage was an “unforeseen” failure and advised that it was conducting a secondary review of all primary substations on the island to assess the functioning of key equipment post Hurricane Matthew.