You’ll never experience prolonged dumsor under Nana Addo - Amewu

Energy Minister John Peter Amewu has told Parliament the circumstance that led to prolonged power outages under former President John Dramani Mahama will never repeat itself under President Akufo-Addo.

He said this administration understands the energy sector better and will manage it financially and technically to prevent the 5-year long dumsor Ghanaians encountered under Mr. Mahama.

Mr Amewu explained the recent outages were as a result of “disturbances” necessitated by challenges at the newly commissioned Accra Central sub-station.

That, he said happened due to a relocation of some two towers to pave the way for the construction of the Pokuase Interchange.

“The fundamental causes of the blackout is the ongoing constructions of road interchange at Pokuase which has necessitated the diversion of GRIDCo’s …transmission lines and towers that run from Tema to Aboadze and that vicinity,” he said.

According to the Minister, the transmission lines in the country are interconnected to the extent that “disruptions in one transmission line has ripple effects on other lines”.

The power plants have been designed to automatically shut down in response to system disturbances, stating it is “protective measure”, adding, there was the need to “temporarily shift and limit power flow through coastal corridor to facilitate stability of the entire transmission network while works are completed on the diversion of the lines at Pokuase.”

“It has a purely operational and technical challenge at the transmission stage; it has nothing to do with technical faults at the generations or distribution stage within the power sector.”

Engineers from Japan are assisting their Ghanaian counterparts to solve the fluctuations in power supply that has rocked the country, he revealed.

“Under his excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, they [Ghanaians are] going to enjoy an uninterrupted supply of power because we understand that power is key for the development of this country,” he stated.