BY LORETTA B MANELE

One of the major challenges in the energy sector is having a legislative framework that is not really compatible to enable us to control the sector says Chris Vehe, Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of Mines, Energy and Rural Electrification (MMERE).

He raised the concern as a panel member of UNDP and MMERE’s Panel Discussion on “Pathways towards better electric power availability, affordability, and sustainability” on Friday, November 14, 2025 at Heritage Park Hotel.

Vehe voiced that we need to have an energy sector that encourages economic development, promotes environmental protection and supports health and education.

He added that disaster preparedness is also very important for this matter.

“It is important that people have to know how to quickly prepare themselves for disasters. I’m not too sure how much people prepared yesterday when there is a sudden change in the weather pattern here in Honiara,” said Vehe.

He highlighted that this comes back to how efficient we can use the sector to be able to disseminate appropriate information.

“…..not only on the judicial review side of things, but we really, really need to have political champions in this space,” added Vehe.

He pointed out that we need to have our leaders with us, driving even this campaign.

“I just want to encourage the team. We need to engage the Prime Minister’s office in driving this.

“We cannot leave them aside while we are trying to do it, because they are the ones who handle the wheel, and we need to be together,” said Vehe.

He also stated that engaging churches, youths and schools is very important as well.

Vehen furthered that he really appreciates the effort so far and encourages everyone to put their heads together in coming up with better policy directions for our leaders in regards to the energy sector.

Commenting on a current survey on national energy planning by MMERE and UNDP, he said unless they carry out proper surveys, only then can they be able to produce proper plans that are practically sound when it comes to implementing.

“Otherwise, we will just be developing policies that are baseless. They are not data-driven, so we ended up having ourselves caught up in a situation where we developed policies that are not practically sound with what is happening in our society,” he said.

For feedback, contact: [email protected]