The generator mafias in Lebanon profit from the gap that exists in the country’s power supply. Learn more about the issue in our previous article tilted “Generator mafias profit from Lebanese power supply gap”. However, on Monday, October 1, 2018, the situation grew more tensed as the competition between the private generator owners reached more serious level. According to a local report, two such generator owners, from Sidon, involved in a fight of securing more clients even escalated the matter to gunshot.
Elnashra is an online newspaper platform that runs independently, whereby the same was informed that the security forces were in the pursuit of the people who were responsible for the brawl.
Following the government’s decision to introduce sterner regulations into the energy sector, the competition of the private generator mafias took a fierce turn. It is reported that from Monday, the government has begun to fix meters for the private generators so as to measure exactly the quantity of electricity being used from each of the machine. This attempt is being made in order to find out the “exact prices” to be charged to the countrymen. Nevertheless, the said move did not go well with the private generator owners and met with a lot of criticism.
So as to make up for the losses that the private generator owners suffered due to the regulatory step taken by the government which in turn reduced “the price of their services”, they became keen to “attract more clients”. The government is not capable of generating sufficient power to meet the supply demand, whereby triggering an electric void which has been troubling for “many years”.
During the power cuts, the residents are left with no choice but to avail the services provided by the generator mafias as it comes at a higher cost. Currently, the “public electricity production in Lebanon stands at 2,000 MW, while national demand goes beyond 3,300 MW in summer months”.
