Member
of Parliament for Manchester North Western Mr Mikael Phillips says at least two teenagers in his constituency have had need for psychiatric help as a direct result of electricity loss since the passage of Hurricane Beryl on July 3.

No surprise there. For as Energy Minister Mr Daryl Vaz told
Radio Jamaica’s
That’s a Wrap programme on Sunday, having no light and power for as long as thousands of people have had to do since Beryl amounts to “living in hell”.

We note that, in regards to his constituency, Mr Phillips has voiced pessimism about the capacity of electricity provider Jamaica Public Service Company (JPS) to meet its deadline for electricity restoration — outside of St Elizabeth — by Monday (today).

We wait to see.

In relation to St Elizabeth, the parish hardest hit by the storm, we are now being told by newly appointed president and CEO of JPS Mr Hugh Grant that Hurricane Beryl’s impact on the company’s facilities there was such that its network will have to be “rebuilt”.

Following a visit to St Elizabeth shortly after his appointment just over a week ago, Mr Grant said: “This is a rebuilding process, not a restoration… Based on the extent of the devastation, the electrical infrastructure that supplies sections of St Elizabeth needs to be completely rebuilt. In some areas, the network will need to be redesigned and lines relocated. The rebuilding process will be challenging…”

And, in a second visit to that south-central parish last Friday, during which he met with political representatives, Mr Grant said: “This is a reset which calls for different levels of planning and resource allocation… It is a whole different scope and mindset…”

All of this begs the question: Why did it take more than a month for JPS — majority owned by overseas private investors –—to work out the magnitude of the problem in St Elizabeth which is so often described as Jamaica’s breadbasket?

The truth is that, within days of Hurricane Beryl’s passing, Jamaicans who were paying attention knew that southern St Elizabeth, southern Manchester, southern Clarendon, and southern Westmoreland — the areas geographically closest to the eye of the storm — had suffered the most damage.

Why then did the JPS not know from very early that its network in St Elizabeth had been completely undermined?

It seems clear that the growing public perception is correct — that for weeks the electricity provider totally underestimated the effect of the hurricane and was ill-prepared for it in the first place.

The Government has already said that going forward it won’t be business as usual, and that appropriate legislation will be developed to better protect bill-paying customers of the electricity provider as part of an overall revamp of disaster response. That’s a position this newspaper fully supports.

But also, it seems to us there is reason to ask whether, given the current experience, an essential service such as the transmission and distribution of electricity should be in private hands.

We wonder, even as we recall the harsh economic circumstances which led to JPS being divested in the first place.

For, as Mr Vaz said on radio Sunday: “No (energy) minister should ever again find [him/herself] in the situation that I am now in…”