Tell Ghanaians the truth - Energy Economist tells Inusah

An Energy Economist, Mohammed Ameen Adam has accused a Deputy Energy Minister, Alhaji Inusah Fuseini of being economical with the truth concerning power generation expansion projects across the country.

Ghana has been bedeviled with inconsistent power supply as the West African Gas Pipeline suffered damage to some of its pipes resulting in a load shedding exercise across the country.

Alhaji Fuseini at a press briefing on Friday stated that the Kufuor–led administration didn’t add a single capacity of power during their eight-year term in government contrary to the New Patriotic Party’s presidential candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo’s statement that some 516 megawatts of power was added by the end of his party’s administration.

Speaking to Accra based Citi Fm on Friday, Mr. Adam stated that the NPP government had the most “comprehensive generation expansion programme in Ghana ever after Nkrumah [President Kwame Nkrumah] built Akosombo.”

He explained saying, “there were two plants; 126 megawatts of emergency power plants which were installed by the NPP during the power crisis of 2006/2007. So for this reason if the Honourable Minister is saying no single megawatt was added, I think that he was very economical with the truth.”

“There is another plant in Tema we call Tema Thermal Plan (1) which is also with an installed capacity of 126 megawatts. By the time the NPP left government, by the end of 2008, the plant was completed and on trail operation test. It was fully completed and funded by the government. On the basis of this second plant, I think that Inusah was not truthful,” he added.

Mr. Adam further revealed that there were other private initiatives which were facilitated by the NPP government such as the Asogli Thermal Plan and the Mine reserve plant.

He therefore advised the Deputy Energy Minster to tell the truth the people of Ghana.

But in response to these accusations and revelations, Alhaji Fuseini clarified that the Mr. Adams references are “emergency power plants. Are emergency power plants part of the installed capacity of this country? No. Infact if emergency power plants were part of the installed capacity of this country, Ghana would have had more than 10,000 megawatts because many homes, towns, industries and businesses have standby generators to power their industries and businesses but they are never counted as part of the installed capacity.”