President John Mahama is backing calls for an increase in utility tariffs by the providers. He says consumers would have to pay more if they want continuous power supply.
The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and the Ghana Water Company, want more than 100 percent increase.
This has however been rejected by some Ghanaians and the Trade Union Congress (TUC), particularly in the face of the poor quality of service.
But President Mahama says power generation is becoming more expensive, justifying the reasons for Ghanaians to pay more. “Hydro is the cheapest and thermal is the most expensive.
When Akosombo Dam was operating at its peak, we relied more on hydro and less on thermal, but the trend would have to change because of the falling water level of the dam.
This will mean that we will use more thermal power which will be more expensive, and so if we genuinely want reliable sustainable power, then we have to pay more,” the President said.
“We all have gone through ‘dumsor’, we spent more fueling generator plants with petrol or diesel. It is far more expensive than what the ECG gives us and so if we want reliable power and not ‘dumsor’ we might have to pay a little bit more, that is the reality.
Because the hydro used to subsidize our power is no longer available. Next year, we will use only two units of the Akosombo else the dam will break down.
We will shut down four units because of the water level. 1.44 ft and minimum ft is 1.40. Normally by this time of the year, the water level is at 1.55 to 1.60 ft and this is a worrying signal” he lamented.
The President made these comments on GBC’s Garden City Radio in the Ashanti Region. He also explained the cause of the Volta River Authority’s indebtedness to the West Africa Gas Pipeline Company (WAPCO) .
The President pointed out that WAPCO broke down in 2012 because the VRA had to spend “huge sums of money buying light crude oil for more than a year … and this affected the VRA’s balance sheets.”
“When the gas pipeline was finally restored, they did not have enough reserves to pay the debt. This also affected payment for the gas and so we reached an agreement with Nigeria gas, that the arrears would be refinanced and paid over a period of time, but VRA will keep up with its current payment.
As I speak, we have paid up to July but there is a legacy debt we also agreed with them to refinance over a period of time.”
