Senegal’s Wade hopes to build nuclear power plant

Wade, who won a second five-year term in a landslide
re-election last month, has already started building new five-star
hotels and airports in the West African country and has plans for
museums, theatres and a nuclear plant.

"It was not just a statement he made during the
campaign," one of his advisers, Christian Sina Diatta, told
pro-government daily newspaper Le Soleil in today’s edition. "It’s an
option the head of state has been working on for some time and he has
already been in contact with nuclear powers who are behind Senegal," he
said. He gave no details on which countries had been contacted for
advice.

Power shortages continue to hamper economic development
across sub-Saharan Africa. In Senegal, one of the most stable countries
in West Africa, regular blackouts – some of them lasting more than 10
hours – forced the government to requisition oil stocks late last year.

Despite increasing world interest in nuclear power as an
alternative to coal and oil-powered generation, massive costs and a
lack of specialists could scupper Africa’s nuclear ambitions, at least
in the medium term, energy experts say.

They say large regional markets for nuclear power need to
be developed before such big investments become viable. If Wade’s plan
comes to fruition, it could be energy-starved Africa’s first nuclear
power plant outside SA. Egypt, Nigeria and Tunisia have also announced
intentions to build nuclear power stations in the long term.

Grand infrastructure projects such as a new coastal
highway around the capital Dakar and the promise of new schools helped
Wade win re-election in the February 25 polls, although many of the
city’s rubbish-strewn suburbs are mired in poverty.