Athaliah Reynolds, Staff Reporter

JUST A week after a major system failure at the Jamaica Public Service Company Limited (JPS) left the nation in total darkness - for the third time in just 18 months - a senior member of the light and power company's management team has stepped down.

Harold Nembhard, vice-president of power delivery services at the JPS, resigned with immediate effect on Tuesday, after 30 years with the company. He was appointed vice-president for power delivery services, with overall responsibility for the transmission network in 2004.

Mr. Nembhard's resignation comes at the same time that head of majority stakeholders, Marubeni Caribbean Power Holdings, published statements outlining its commitment to improving all areas of JPS operations.

"We have also brought in the expertise of our technical team in Atlanta to determine the most effective ways of improving JPS's capability in the areas of power generation, transmission and distribution, environment, health and safety," the published advertisement read.

Winsome Callum, head of communications at JPS, told The Gleaner that Mr. Nembhard voluntarily tendered his resignation as he felt it was the right thing to do following the all-island power outage last week. Ms. Callum said the January 9 outage was caused by a problem on the transmission system.

On Tuesday, the Office of Utilities Regulation said it intended to increase scrutiny of the light and power company's maintenance practices in light of last Wednesday's blackout.

athaliah.reynolds@gleanerjm.com