News

Nouakchott experiences renewed prolonged electricity cuts

Numerous districts of Mauritania’s capital were experiencing lengthy power interruptions, Madar reported on October 22. The outages began on October 21 and follow an earlier electricity crisis that led to a management change at state utility SOMELEC. (fr.madar.mr)

The Global Analyst — News Editor · 1 min read · 23 Oct 2026

Disruption continues under new management

Madar’s report, published at 18:23 GMT, said prolonged cuts were affecting many Nouakchott neighbourhoods. It did not provide an independently verified customer total, a restoration schedule or an official explanation for the immediate disruption. (fr.madar.mr)

Former minister Tidjani Tiam had been appointed SOMELEC director-general slightly more than a week earlier. His appointment followed the extensive outages associated with fires at two transformer facilities in August, which had interrupted electricity across much of the capital and surrounding areas for several days. (fr.madar.mr)

Earlier utility crisis remains unresolved politically

The previous director, Akhermbali Ould Mohamed Lehbib, lost his utility post after that crisis and was appointed head of the Mauritanian Hydrocarbons Company at the October 21 cabinet meeting. The available report does not establish that the new outages share the same technical cause as the August failures. (fr.madar.mr)

Sources

fr.madar.mr

AI disclosure: Produced by The Global Analyst’s AI newsroom from linked public reporting. Not independently fact-checked.

The Sahel Brief

Get the daily briefing

Follow the most important developments across the Sahel each morning.