25 persons arrested over illegal electricity connection

Twenty-five persons have been arrested by officials of the Northern Electricity Distribution Company (NEDCo) of the Volta River Authority (VRA) in Tamale for engaging in illegal electricity connection.

The 25 people, who are all residents of Dohinayili, a suburb of the Tamale Central constituency, have together consumed a total of GH¢75,098.19, Head of Corporate Communications of VRA-NEDCo, Mr. Maxwell Kotoka told journalists at a press briefing in Tamale today.

He also cited Aboabo, Zogbeli, Lamakara, Changli and Gumbihini as communities where their residents were increasingly gaining notoriety in stealing power and defaulting in the payment of bills.

Mr. Kotoka stated that, henceforth, the power company was embarking on “naming and shaming” as another form of mechanism to fight illegal electricity connection in Tamale and its surrounding areas.

Below is the full press statement read by the Head of Corporate Communications of VRA-NEDCo.

PRESS BRIEFING BY NEDCO ON THE EVENTS LEADING TO DAYS OF UNRESOLVED POWER SUPPLY INTERRUPTIONS AT DOHINAAYILI, A SUBURB OF TAMALE – TUESDAY, JULY 11, 2017 AT THE CONFERENCE ROOM OF THE NORTHERN AREA.

Distinguished Members of the Media, Ladies and Gentlemen, Good Afternoon to you all. On behalf of the Management and Staff of Northern Electricity Distribution Company (NEDCo), we wish to welcome you all to this briefing and to immensely thank you for responding to our invitation at such a short notice.

Over the past few days, NEDCo has received some significant reportage as well as a fairly massive media attention and commentary. Ladies and Gentlemen, we deem it fit to brief you formally on the events leading to this, how the impasse was resolved and to use the occasion to advise all going forward.

ANTECEDENTS

In the recent past, NEDCo staff have suffered a myriad of worrying cases of assault, threat to life, intimidation, physical hindrance and harassment in the course of discharging their legitimate duties as responsible civil servants. These duties include installation of Pre-Paid Meters (PPMs), monitoring of PPMs, disconnection of defaulting customers and direction of service of court summons. Sadly, a significant number of our customers abhor and can simply not tolerate these actions because once they are carried out successfully, their chances of either stealing power from NEDCo or perpetuating their indebtedness to NEDCo becomes bleak. For this reason, we have been assaulted, threatened, intimidated, physically hindered and/or harassed in the past in various suburbs of Tamale. These include Aboaba, Zogbeli, Lamakara, Changli, Gumbihini to mention a few. This impunity kept growing in leaps and bounds as even on one occasion, it led to a sit-down strike by staff who accused Management of not protecting them. On that occasion, the matter was as usual, reported to the Police who did their bit by charging the suspects only for them to refuse to show up in court.

Matters got to a head when the police, in an attempt to effect the Bench Warrant that was issued against them, were pelted away from the community. Eventually, Management had to use alternative means to resolve the impasse and to get staff to rescind their decision to strike and get back to work. Ladies and Gentlemen, perhaps, the most painful part of all these is that before we are humiliated, the communities are quick to remind us of how we were “stopped” or “disciplined” in other communities; adding that they would even do more.

Distinguished members of the Media, this is the antecedent of the recent events at Dohinaayili; we have been compelled to outline all these so as to properly posit the Dohinaayili incident.

DOHINAAYILI INCIDENT

In the forenoon of Wednesday, July 05 2017, a NEDCo Team was in Dohinaayili with a Court Bailiff directing service of court summons to some residents who had been caught by NEDCo in various acts of illegal connections and power theft. Ordinarily, the Bailiff should have done the service alone but because of the gawky house numbering system, NEDCo had to accompany the Bailiff. It must therefore be noted that NEDCo was ONLY assisting the court official to execute an order of the Court, the fountain of Law and Order in our society.

After an hour or so of working, the NEDCo Team (including the Bailiff) had moved significantly away from the official NEDCo-branded vehicle that conveyed them to the community. At this point, a group of young men wielding clubs, machetes, sticks, metal bars, catapults and wooden planks with nails perforated through them chanting antagonistic tunes and threats moved towards the NEDCo vehicle ostensibly, in search of the NEDCo Team. As the NEDCo Team was not immediately in sight, the charged youth deflated three of the four tyres of the NEDCo vehicle thereby demobilizing the vehicle and significantly denying the Team any real chances of retreat or even escape.

Having succeeded in this, the youth then went into the community scouting for the NEDCo Team; from the loud chants of the youth, our Team sensed danger so they kept moving away from the din till they could no more. The youth caught up with them and molested the Team Leader, heckling him by the collar of his shirt. Fortunately, our Team escaped by rushing into some tri-cycles that were passing by as some on-lookers sought to know from the youth what the matter was. As our Team escaped, the youth warned that they would not be lucky next time as there would be bloodshed.

While the Bailiff went to report to the Court, the NEDCo staff came to report the incident to Management which directed that the matter be reported to Police immediately.It had to take armed police escort for NEDCo to move a vulcanizer to the demobilized vehicle to recover it. Later that day, a number of faults were reported to the NEDCo office which faults included one from Dohinaayili (others include one each from Dungu UDS Campus, Police Barracks Primary School and Ministry of Agriculture). All the other faults were fixed that same day but the one at Dohinaayili could not be attended to as our staff argued that given the events of the day coupled with the threats of bloodshed that were issued, they did not feel safe enough to go back into the community for whatever reason. Management also had its hands tied as it lacked the moral courage to compel them to go back into that same hostile community to address a fault, especially bearing in mind the recent dastardly mob actions in other parts of the country. The situation persisted as NEDCo was looking for assurances of unqualified and unequivocal safety and security for its staff.

NAMING AND SHAMING

Ladies and Gentlemen, perhaps, this is the most opportune time to delve into how much money and which customers were involved in the illegal connections in Dohinaayili. Management has decided that going forward, NEDCo will add “naming and shaming” to the tools available to her for fighting illegal connections. Under the circumstances, Dohinaayili has offered itself as a very fine starting point. Accordingly, below are the names and their various estimated stolen power in cedis: