Former Member of Parliament for Sekondi, Andrew Agyapa-Mercer, has called for urgent investment in Ghana’s ageing electricity transmission infrastructure, warning that resource constraints could continue to undermine efforts to stabilise the power supply.
Speaking on Newsfile on JoyNews on Saturday, August 22, Mr Agyapa-Mercer said successive governments had made efforts to replace portions of the country’s transmission network, but significant gaps remained.
His comments follow a nationwide power disruption in parts of Ghana on Thursday, August 20, after the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) attributed the outage to a trip in power transmission lines.
The latest incident is the second major disruption recorded in August, raising concerns about the resilience of Ghana’s power transmission system.
Mr Agyapa-Mercer said the country’s transmission infrastructure is “extremely old” and requires substantial investment to bring it up to the standard needed to reliably transport electricity across the country.
“We have extremely old transmission infrastructure. Governments over the years have tried to replace some of them. It’s not complete. There’s still a lot of work that has to be done,” he said.
He also questioned whether the switchyard and control room affected by a fire on June 29 had undergone sufficient rehabilitation or replacement since their installation.
“I’m not so sure whether the switchyard that got burnt on 29 June thereabout itself has seen any replacement since what was installed, and we need to be informed as to whether, indeed and in fact, that switchyard or control room had seen some rehabilitation right from the very beginning when this thing was put in place,” he said.
Mr Agyapa-Mercer stressed that the challenge should not be reduced to partisan politics, arguing that inadequate resources for transmission infrastructure would continue to affect the power sector regardless of which political party is in government.
“And so yes, I’m because I’ve been there before. I’m not going to play the politics game because you never know. Tomorrow I may be back there, and these issues, to the extent that we are unable to find the resources to invest in the transmission infrastructure to carry our power from point A to B, will persist,” he said.
He said he was prepared to give the government the benefit of the doubt following an indication that improvements in the power situation could be seen by next month.
However, he questioned how the government intends to mobilise the resources required to deliver those improvements.
“I will give you the benefit of the doubt. He indicated to the rule of Ghana that we expect to see some improvement in the power situation by next month. I hope the requisite investment is being put in, and that they’re going to get the resources from there. He’s not indicated,” he said.
Mr Agyapa-Mercer further questioned whether GRIDCo has the financial capacity to undertake the required investments from its own balance sheet.
“I’m not sure whether Gridco itself can finance this on this balance sheet, and so that clarity ought to be provided,” he added.
He also cited calls from the Deputy Ranking Member of Parliament’s Energy Committee for the Energy Minister to brief the committee on the causes of the recent disruptions and measures being taken to resolve them.
“I’ve had the deputy ranking member of the Energy Committee make a call for the minister to brief the Energy Committee extensively on the issues and what it is that they are doing to resolve it,” he said.
Myjoyonline
