KOTA KINABALU: The future of Sabah Electricity Sdn Bhd (SESB) will be determined following ongoing discussions between the energy, green technology and water ministry (KeTTHA), finance ministry and Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB).
KeTTHA minister Maximus Ongkili said the decision would be crucial as SESB continues to make losses and is on the verge of insolvency.
“SESB’s current average tariff is 34.52 sen/kwh while cost of energy generation is 56.50 sen/kwh. Hence, the federal government has been subsidising SESB’s fuel costs, ie. primarily diesel, medium fuel oil (MFO) and gas,” he said in a statement.
He added that the federal government had also been providing the bulk of SESB’s capital expenditure.
TNB owns 82.75% of SESB, while the rest of the stake is held by the Sabah state government.
Since 2012, the federal government has spent RM4.2 billion to boost SESB’s operations, with both TNB and SESB also spending their portion on capex expenditure.
For the period between 2016 and 2019, the federal government had also allocated RM2.3 billion for capex and reducing the System Average Interruption Duration Index (Saidi).
Ongkili said through these efforts, the Saidi had been reduced from 777 minutes/customer/year in 2014 to 311 last year, and was expected to be further reduced to 280 by year-end.
SESB has been asking for a tariff revision since its last review in 2014. However, it is also the federal government’s duty to ensure tariff is fair and affordable to consumers.
“We also want to ensure that the tariff revision is reflective of the quality of power delivered,” Ongkili said in response to comments by TNB CEO Azman Mohd.
Azman had said that they were discussing the future of SESB and that an agreement was expected by the new year to determine the best option. -FMT
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