- "Nobody should take the people of Ghana for granted, although by the end of 2016 majority of "dumsor" was solved. The people of Ghana took the NDC out because of the situation they went through.”
The chief executive officer of African Energy Consortium, Kwame Jantuah, is warning that the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) risks losing power at the next election if it does not immediately solve what he described as the country’s power crisis.
Power consumers across Ghana have had to grapple with intermittent power cuts, raising fears that the country has returned to the era of electricity rationing (dumsor).
Despite the frustration, the Energy Minister, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, has attributed the present situation to ongoing maintenance work.
Speaking on The Forum, a current affairs and news analysis programme on Asaase Radio, the African Energy Consortium boss said the New Patriotic Party government must fix the problem within its first two years in office to avoid defeat for the NPP in 2024.
“Nobody should take the people of Ghana for granted. Although by the end of 2016 the majority of ‘dumsor’ was solved, the people of Ghana took the NDC out because of the situation they went through,” he said.
Jantuah added: “And this government, if they don’t solve ‘dumsor’ by the mid of their reign, they will go out of power, because the people of Ghana have given you the mandate to serve us and to make sure whatever the people need is done.”
Realistic tariffs
Jantuah also wants the government to desist from playing politics with energy tariffs. He called for a national forum to help review the current regime to ensure that consumers pay realistic rates for power.
“We should look at the tariff system. We should start telling Ghanaians this system will collapse if we don’t pay realistic tariffs – subsidies today won’t help, so we should look at the tariff system – and it is time for that discussion.”
He added: “And if that discussion is going to happen, it should not be only in the caucus of the NPP. Get all stakeholders round the table and let us discuss it and make sure that whatever results come from that discussion [are] permanent and can be continuous.”
Fred Dzakpata
Asaase Radio 99.5 – tune in or log on to broadcasts online
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