The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) says it cannot give a specific load shedding timetable as quantum of power received from their source over the past weeks has not been consistent.
PURC) had earlier called on ECG to as a matter of urgency publish a time table. According to the PURC, the power generation companies are bound by law to publish a timetable to allow consumers plan ahead of time but ECG says, it cannot provide any timetable.
Director of Operations for ECG, Engineer Tetteh Okine told Citi Business News, they are maintaining the initial load-shedding timetable which allows for 12 hours of power supply , and 24 hours of power outage.
”On a day to day basis, depending on the challenge on the ground, the 12 hour of power supply and 24 hours of power outage is still running”.
According to him, a change can be made only when there are definite figures, ”but it varies from day to day and its difficult to do a timetable with quantities which are varying.”
Most companies have asserted that ECG’s failure to publish the load shedding time table and in some cases stick to what it has published makes it difficult for them to plan in the midst of the crisis.
Telecom giant MTN Ghana is one of many companies that has called for the Electricity Company of Ghana to follow the published load shedding time table.
MTN Ghana’s former CEO Serame Taukobong earlier told Citi Business News “the critical thing is engaging with government to find solutions to the problem and yes we don’t have 100 percent reliability on ECG, that is why we have got such a high consumption on fuels and consumed as much as 2 million liters of fuel per month.
Though we have a three plan back-up at most of our critical sites on a genset or even the battery backup but obviously the lack of fuel and battery does affect your ability to serve customers.”
