Accra, Ghana, July 31, 2019//-The confusion between Ghana government and the U.S backed Power Distribution Services Ghana (PDS) Limited is far from over.
The company whose concession agreement was suspended by the Ghana’s Ministry of Finance through the Electricity Company of Ghana just year has reacted angrily.
The Chief Executive of PDS, William Hutton-Mensah denied that the company acted in bad faith in its dealing with government with regards to the takeover of the ECG.
But William Hutton-Mensah in a statement published on PDS’ website said the company has taken note of the government’s statement, stressing, “PDS wishes to state for the record that it has always acted and will continue to act in good faith at all times.”
According to him, the company would go through due process by complying with the terms of the transaction agreements executed between it and ECG on one hand and government of Ghana through the Ministry of Finance on the other hand.
“PDS also wishes to assure the Ghanaian public that it will not rush to put out any information until it has been sufficiently substantiated, in the interest of safeguarding the transaction and the image of Ghana,” PDS Chief Executive Officer noted on Wednesday.
The concession agreement which took effect from March 1, 2019 abruptly came to an end on Tuesday, July 30, 2019 when government of Ghana announced that it has suspended the agreement.
PDS backed by the U.S was supposed to manage the operations of the ECG for 20 years.
For the record, Ghana signed the Power Compact with the United States of America acting through the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), on the side-lines of the US Africa Leaders’ Summit in Washington DC on August 5, 2014 attended by H.E. President John Dramani Mahama.
Under the Power Compact, six projects were being implemented to address the root causes of the unavailability and unreliability of power in Ghana.
The projects included ECG Financial and Operational Turnaround Project, NEDCo Financial and Operational Turnaround Project, Regulatory Strengthening and Capacity Building Project and Access Project.
The rest are Power Generation Sector Improvement Project and Energy Efficiency, and Demand Side Management Project.
The private sector company was expected to turnaround the operations of ECG to make it profitable. In addition, the new concessionaire was expected to improve access to electricity while cutting down on waste in the system to block all leakages that drain the financials of ECG.
African Eye Report
