Dumsor Now 24 Hours in Ghana

The power crisis in Ghana has intensified, with many people in Accra and several parts of the country, currently experiencing 24-hour power outage and only 12 hours of power supply. In some cases, customers of the Electricity of Ghana (ECG) enjoy only six hours of uninterrupted power supply. The power crisis has affected many businesses which have led to the shutdown of factories and dismissal of workers even though government claims there is no load-shedding. Mahama Denies Load-shedding President John Mahama recently said he would not declare load-shedding despite admitting challenges in the power sector in the country. Addressing Muslims on the occasion of Eid al-Fitr, the president attributed the recent power outages to “sabotage in Nigeria” which is preventing the supply of crude oil to power the thermal plants. However, some energy experts in the country believe government is not telling Ghanaians the truth about the real situation in the power sector. According to them, government’s claim that there is no load-shedding currently in parts of the country was untrue. Mahama Playing politics Dr. Steve Manteaw, Executive Director, Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC), in a recent interview withBUSINESS GUIDE, said the president was politicizing the issues instead of telling Ghanaians the whole truth. “If what the country is experiencing is not load-shedding, then I don’t know what it is. Load-shedding is not what people say it is: it is what we experience or feel. What the president is saying is part of the politics,” he said. Dr. Manteaw said the actual problem is that government does not have money to purchase fuel to power the thermal plants. Timetable Issues Many civil society organizations and institutions have called on the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and the Public Utilities and Regulatory Commission (PURC) to as a matter of urgency release a load-shedding timetable. This, according to them, would help Ghanaians and institutions to plan their activities accordingly. After persistent calls on ECG to provide load-shedding timetable, a two-week load-shedding management timetable, said to take effect from August 1, 2016, surfaced on social media last Friday. ECG’s Disclaimer However, ECG quickly denied knowledge of such timetable, advising the public, particularly its customers, to ignore the report. In a statement released on its website on Saturday, the ECG said, “The attention of the ECG has been drawn to a load-shedding timetable purportedly drawn and issued to the general public by an unknown person (s). “The ECG wishes to state categorically that it has not issued any such load-shedding timetable since the national load-shedding committee chaired by Ing. William Amuna- CEO of GRIDCo has not advised ECG on any such schedule. “The general public and all stakeholders are advised to ignore the supposed load-shedding timetable currently in the public domain.”