‘Liberty to supply power, water not limited to EWA’

The Government of Bahrain has stated that any entity can obtain the required permission to provide electricity and water supply services in the Kingdom, Tribune has learnt. This came in reply to a Bahraini lawyer, who recently filed a case against the Electricity and Water Authority (EWA), the sole electricity and water supplier in the Kingdom.

In his complaint, lawyer Mohammed Al Thawadi urgently demanded to cancel the authority’s decision to apply VAT on subscribers’ bills since the beginning of the current year. Mr Al Thawadi justified his decision to complain against EWA by stating that the authority is the only provider of such services in the country without market competition, contrary to the conditions of imposing the tax on commodities.

Explaining further, the lawyer affirmed that one of the conditions required to apply the tax mentions that “the state does not undertake such purchases as sovereign and there is competition between the public and private sectors”, a competition which he said does not exist in the case of providing electricity and water supply services in Bahrain.

Representing the EWA in the court was the State Cases Authority, which clarified that “the authority does not exercise its functions as sovereign and there is no monopoly”.