Like he did during Hurricane Beryl last year, Energy Minister Daryl Vaz has begun to get impatient with utility provider Jamaica Public Service (JPS), three days after Jamaica was hit by Hurricane Melissa on October 28, leaving catastrophic destruction in its path in a number of southwestern parishes.

The storm has decimated the JPS infrastructure in the hardest-hit parishes of St Elizabeth, Westmoreland, Trelawny, St James, Hanover and Manchester.

However, parishes that were not severely impacted by Melissa are also facing significant power outages. This has resulted in 462,000 of JPS’s approximately 700,000 customers remaining without power as of Friday morning.

Vaz told a media briefing on Friday that he had indicated to JPS CEO and President Hugh Grant that he must revert to the Beryl way of providing updates.

“The communication that is coming out is not enough. Not enough to me and it’s not enough to those who’re affected. So it’s not only about the amount of people who’ve been restored, it’s how many more are to be restored and what is the projection for them to be restored,” Vaz said.

Vaz said Grant had informed him that the entire Kingston and St Andrew would be back up by Sunday. “I told him that’s not good enough, he needs to publish, as they used to do on their social media, and through their communication network, exactly where we are every day, which communities can expect [to be restored] and when”.

Vaz shared that KSA will be restored up to 90 per cent by Sunday; St Thomas 90 per cent by midnight Sunday and St Catherine 75 per cent.

“We still want to hear about St Mary and Portland and the others,” the energy minister said, noting that there were a large number of parishes with the majority of customers without electricity.

A breakdown of the numbers below shows the number of JPS customers in each parish who are still without power:

-Clarendon 63 per cent

-Hanover 98 per cent

-KSA North – 26 per cent

-KSA South – 4 per cent

-Manchester -99 per cent

-Portland -83 per cent

-Portmore – 64 per cent

-St Ann – 99 per cent

-St Catherine – 48 per cent

-St Elizabeth – 99 per cent

-St James 99 per cent

-St Mary 99 per cent

-St Thomas 10 per cent

-Trelawny 99 per cent

-Westmoreland – 99 per cent

“I commit to all the customers of the JPS that as of today you will be getting more detailed information and you have my commitment that we will stay on them until such time as full restoration in the unaffected areas, and a comprehensive plan for the affected areas within the next few days after the assessments have been completed,” said Vaz.

-Lynford Simpson