The Senior Divisional Officer for Ntem Valley has announced that compensation claims will cost about FCFA 2 billion.

Owners of land and property to be affected by the imminent construction of the Memve’ele Hydroelectric Dam in Ntem Valley Division in the South Region will soon begin receiving their money, reports state-owned CRTV radio. It quotes the Senior Divisional Officer, SDO or administrator for Ntem Valley as saying the total amount to be paid out is FCFA 2 billion.

The 35-metre high Memve’ele falls are located on River Ntem in the south-eastern part of Cameroon in the middle of the equatorial rain forest. A successful feasibility study for the construction of a hydroelectric dam on the site was carried out by Nippon Koei in 1993. The feasibility study was later updated in 2006 by Coyne et Belier. Upon completion, the project could generate 200 MW of electricity.

The project aims at generating electricity independently of the hydrology of River Sanaga which up to now has been the sole purveyor of hydroelectricity in the Southern Electricity Grid of Cameroon with the Edea and Song-Loulou dams. It is also to generate electricity for the northern part of Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and Congo.