The Member of Parliament for Assin Central, Kennedy Agyapong, says the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) government must fix recent erratic power outages, rather than engage in blame games and excuses.
According to him, the Akufo-Addo government must continue to stabilise the country’s electricity as it has done in the last two years.
The maverick legislator believes government must focus on fixing the problem, rather than laying blame on the erstwhile National Democratic Congress (NDC) government.
“To say it is a financial challenge, is no excuse. We have to solve the problem because it was part of our campaign promises, and we’ve been able to stabilize it for two years, so however we did it, we have to continue to sustain it. There is no excuse for us,” Mr. Agyapong said on Adom TV’s Badwam show.
In recent weeks, residents in some parts of Accra and Kumasi have lamented the unannounced power outages in their areas.
This has sparked concerns of a possible return to days of rationed power supply, popularly referred to as “dumsor”.
Kennedy Agyapong said the NPP government must be sincere with Ghanaians and tell them the exact situation at hand.
According to him, failure on the part of government to solve the power situation will be a big embarrassment for the NPP.
“We have to be straightforward, honest and sincere to Ghanaians and tell them that this is the challenge, and we are going to solve it. My question is that, if you criticize NDC in 2016, as politicians and government, we have to line up all the failures of NDC and what we condemned, and take them one by one and solve them. That makes you a better government. But if you also come and the same problem you condemned to win election, you can’t solve it, then even the technical people will even say politicians are not to be believed,” the Assin Central MP added.
Meanwhile the Energy Minister, John Peter Amewu has explained that the erratic supply of power is as a result of some financial challenges faced by the government.
According to him, the government has been unable to reach an agreement with the West African Gas Pipeline Authority (WAGPA), concerning charges for the transfer of gas from the Western part of the country to the East.
He said while the West African Gas Pipeline Company Limited (WAPCO) expected US$3.2 per MMBtu as tariff, the government was only willing to pay US$1 per MMBtu.
Mr. Amewu was, however, quick to add that both parties have reached an agreement on US$1.7 per MMBTu which the government finds more favourable.
Source: pulse.com.gh
