‘Dumsor’: Amewu telling half-truths – IES

The Institute for Eenergy Security (IES) has accused Energy minister Peter Amewu of telling half-truths in the power outages afflicting the nation.

According to the energy think tank, the power challenge is due to the lack of money to purchase gas fuel power generators, and the minister must be candid with Ghanaians over it.

"To be charitable, the explanations offered by the Minister of Energy during the Press Conference is misleading and half-truth...what Ghanaians are experiencing is largely due to liquidity challenges in the power sector as heavily-indebted Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) is unable to redeem its debt obligations to especially Independent Power Producers (IPPs); leading to Power Plants fuel procurement challenges and load shedding,” IES said in a statement.

It added: “for the year 2018, there was a projected thermal generation of 11,301.65 GWh and a projected fuel cost of Ghc4.7 billion (US$1.0 Billion)."

"Despite the biting debt on the Volta River Authority (VRA)’s books, in the 2018 Power year, they are required to cough out Gh¢1.57 billion representing 33.57% of the cost while the remaining Gh¢3.13 billion representing 66.43% will be required by the Independent Power Producers.”

“Our major problem now is finance, hard cash to pay for fuel. As a nation irrespective of who occupies the seat, there are fundamental issues we must address and move away from short term issues and the near lazy approach."

“The last tariff reduction was very good for government but very debilitating for the energy sector...we are just delaying the inevitable to score easy political points,” the Pru East MP told Francis Abban on the Morning Starr Tuesday.