Sharjah in the dark again

Sharjah: It happens year after year with unfailing regularity, and yet no corrective action seems to be taken.

Power cuts have returned to plague Sharjah yet again, but the authorities continue to keep residents in the dark about the cause of the blackouts or when they will be able to come up with a solution.

The outage hit tenants hard on Tuesday night with many areas left without electricity or running water from 8pm to 4am yesterday. Localities affected included Maliha, Buheirah Corniche, Al Khan, Al Majaz, Al Qasimia, Jamal Abdul Nasser Street and King Faisal Street.

Mohammad Yaqoub, a UAE national who owns a workers' accommodation in Industrial Area 13, said his employees refused to work yesterday. "Diesel is very expensive and if I had to provide them with a generator it would cost Dh5,000 a day. Every year we have the same problem and by now Sharjah Electricity and Water Authority [Sewa] should have come up with an alternative. Sewa could provide us with a schedule of the power cuts," he said.

Farouq Al Kamali, another UAE national, said the authorities should construct a new power station to cope with the high demand during summer.

With inputs from Duraid Al Baik, Associate Editor

• 12 hours of power cuts endured daily in industrial areas
• Dh15m is the average daily loss incurred by industrial units due to power outages last year
• 150,000 residents affected by power cuts