18-year-old fined for stealing ECG meters

The Achimota District Court has convicted Maxwell Afful, 18, to a fine of 40 penalty units for stealing and possessing stolen meters belonging to the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG).

In default, the accused, who pleaded guilty to the charges of illegal possession of stolen property and intentionally interfering with the supplier’s distribution system, meters and any equipment, will serve four months jail term.

Narrating the facts of the case to the court presided over by His Worship Prince Osei Owusu, the prosecution said, Afful was arrested by the Achimota Mile 7 Police Patrol team at dawn with a backpack containing some tools and six meters that had been stolen from the premises of ECG customers.

The prosecution said the accused, now convict, in his statement, admitted to removing the meters installed for households and reselling them to other customers at different locations.

Dr Mark Owusu Ansah, the Revenue Protection Manager of ECG, Accra West Region, in a news brief, bemoaned the worrying trend and said the menace was frustrating the Company’s delivery of quality service.

He said the meters, which were geo-tagged, helped ECG monitoring teams to track their movements.

“All our installed meters are geo-tagged to indicate their exact locations. This helps our teams to monitor the state of our meter installations regularly,” he said, adding that, however, stealing, reselling and changing the original location of installed meters was affecting the revenue generation of the Company because some clients used power without paying due to the illegality.

Emmanuel Akinie, the General Manager of ECG, Accra West region, warned criminals engaged in meter thefts and sales to desist from such acts.

Akinie said the Company was introducing technology to aid in identifying meters that were stolen and re-installed.

The Accra West region, which is made up of eight operational districts, has since the beginning of this year recorded about 600-meter theft cases in four out of the eight operational districts.

The eight operational districts are Ablekuma, Achimota, Amasaman, Bortianor, Dansoman, Kaneshie, Korlebu and Nsawam.