The Ashanti Region has recorded 230 fires from faulty electrical wiring alone in the last 10 years, resulting in property damage worth GH¢5million.Over the same period, over 300victims suffered from various degrees of burns, the Ashanti Regional Public Relations Officer of the Ghana National Fire Service (GNFS), Mr Desmond Ackah, has disclosed.
He told the Daily Graphic during a one-day electrical seminar on electrical cables and accessories organised by Tropical Cable and Conductor Limited (TCCL) in Kumasi, that a trail of investigations by the GNFS over the years, had indicated that a lot of fires erupted due to the shoddy work of unqualified and uncertified electrical contractors who wired the houses. The seminar was aimed at educating the over 300 certified electrical contractors and inspectors to sensitise them to electrical safety, best wiring practices and inspection and testing of electrical installations, as well as exposing them to the product lines of Tropical Cable and Conductor Limited. They were also introduced to the scratch seals on TCCL products, which could be sent as short message services (SMS) to a short code to certify that the product was original, with other details.
Causes
According to Mr Ackah, other causes of the fires were due to the use of substandard electrical wires and circuits that easily catch fires. Other electricians also fail to put fuses at the appropriate areas that arrest or take the excess power and the resultant fluctuations that might cause fires. He noted that overloading of electrical gadgets on single plugs was also identified as part of the problem.
TCCL
The Marketing and Business Development Manager of TCCL, NanaKwame Oteng Gyasi, noted that the seminar was to educate the general public and the practitioners about the correct uses of electrical cables and accessories. Nana Oteng-Gyasi said the contractors would also be taken through how to identify quality, durable and certified products that would help them undertake quality jobs that would be beneficial to the customers, while saving the country from spending so much in quenching fires and caring for the injured.
He explained that TCCL products were manufactured with the highest international standards suitable for the local environment and that over the ears, both international and local experts had attested to their durability. He urged the general public to use the services of well trained and certified contractors to undertake their wiring and always insist on inspecting the certification of such contractors before engaging them, saying: “ This is the surest way of averting preventable fires caused by substandard electrical wires and fake electrical contractors.”
