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The Rural Electrification Fund (REF) board chairman Willard Chiwewe says the rural electrification programme has the potential to transform the lives of the rural people of Zimbabwe which had been marginalised for a long time.

Chiwewe made the remark during the official commissioning of electricity at Shazhaume primary and Budirirai secondary schools in Mwenezi district on April 7 this year by the Deputy Minister of Energy and Power Development Senator Tsitsi Muzenda.

He said REF was correcting the colonial imbalances in which the white government favoured only towns and cities as well as large scale commercial farms in the electrification programme at the expense of rural communities where the majority of indigenous people live.

“During our time as indigenous people we never got the opportunity to use electricity in the rural areas as the colonial government never saw the importance of rural areas where over 70 percent of our population live,” he said.

With over 8,000 public institutions having been electrified since the formation of REF in 2002, Chiwewe urged villagers living in the catchment area of the grid to organise themselves and have their homes electrified as the power was already nearby.

“I urge all the communities around to tap into this electricity asset for it has the full potential to completely change your way of life,” he said.

He said rural electrification is definitely going to trigger development and empowerment of rural communities as they venture into income-generating projects such as irrigation and welding.

“It’s no doubt that electricity is the power behind development and it’s my wish to see rural institutions enjoying the comfort of one source of energy or the other by 2018,” he said.

Chiwewe said his board, management and staff were committed to fulfil the mandate of facilitating rapid and equitable electrification of all rural areas of Zimbabwe for development and empowerment. He said institutions which are far away from the existing grid network will be provided with other sources of energy such as biogas and solar temporarily while those within the 20km radius from the grid will be energised through the grid network.