Editorial: Water & Electricity Companies Must Sit Up

The quality of utility services provided to the people of this country is becoming pathetically unacceptable for a nation that is seeking to accelerate in its developmental efforts to become a middle-income country by 2015. We refer here to the availability of water and electricity in particular, to the people of Ghana.

Water, is said to be life; for without it, no life form can exist. It is therefore a necessity for the sustenance of life.

Unfortunately, the quality of water supply to various communities in the country seem to be on the decline and many more people in areas where water supply was never known to be a problem are seen these days, roaming all over town in search of water.

Sadly enough, even as the Ghana Water Company Limited (GWC) cry for resources to improve its services, it has not been responsible enough in protecting the limited resources available to it.

It is no uncommon to see potable water gushing out of broken pipelines and in spite of incessant calls by consumers through the airwaves, courtesy, radio stations, for GWC to plug the points of leakages, the company?s responses have never been prompt enough.

There have been times too that they have been rendered helpless by their Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) counterparts, through erratic power supply that affect the operations of their pumping machines.

The spate of disruptions in power supply to the people of Ghana these days, clearly demonstrates a utility company that has become clueless and helpless about how to supply an essential service to teeming consumers, in spite of the monopoly it enjoys.

The Chronicle views the recent rampant disruptions to power supply that is fast becoming an acceptable development, without any indications from ECG that the underlining problems are being resolved, as highly unacceptable.

Many are those who have lost their valuable equipments through these power disruptions. Unfortunately, consumers seem to lack the courage to take ECG to task, and probably get them to pay for losses incurred through what one can without any reservations describe as ?recklessness of the highest order.?

It is true that machines can fail. However, the consistency of the power problems and the frequency of it now seem to go beyond what could be described as unexpected power outages.

It has become a routine.

The last time The Chronicle brought to the attention of Ghanaians the list of problems international observers see as forming barriers to our country as an investment destination, through the Financial Times of London, some people in government were not happy with us.

But the hard fact is that these problems identified, including unreliable power supply, affect not only the foreign investor, but Ghanaian businesses as well.

It is the hope of The Chronicle that the ministries responsible for Water Resources and Energy, would approach the problems confronting the provision of these essential services with all alacrity, to give a little more attraction to our country; making it good for living and also for business.