South Africa analyst Andrew Kenny said in an Aug. 18 published report that investors would fear political and commercial risk "from an unstable government in a country wracked with bloody conflict.”

He also said investors would be averse to other risks, including those associated with having transmission lines owned by surrounding countries, potential property confiscation, very high tariffs and "incompetent maintenance.”

First East Africa Regional Initiative

The World Bank says the Rusumo Falls project in Rwanda-Tanzania is the first under the Great Lakes Regional Initiative, an effort by a group of global lenders that was inaugurated by World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim following a visit to the area last May.

The bank says the overall project price tag is $469 million, but it did not specify how the remaining cost would be covered.

Colin Bruce, a World Bank official, says that lack of access to electricity is a defining constraint in the region. Only 4% of the population in Burundi has access to electricity; in Rwanda and Tanzania, the figures are 13% and 15%, respectively.

“The Rusumo Falls hydroelectric project takes a regional approach to tackling sub-Saharan Africa’s power crisis,” says Jamal Saghir, World Bank director for sustainable development in the Africa region.