Stop the Finger-pointing and Keep the Lights On; Former Energy Minister to Gov’t
Former Energy Minister, Herbert Krapah has charged the new government to get to work to keep the country’s power on and desist from pointing accusing fingers at the past government.
In a statement, Krapah refused to shoulder the blame for the “looming” erratic power supply across the country by his Co-Chairman on the Transition Team sub-committee on Energy and Natural Resources, Hon John Jinapor.
“Mr. Jinapor is wrong. Load shedding does not ‘loom’. It is caused either by technical or emergency power generation issues or a lack of competence in managing the power sector. Mr. Jinapor seems to be haunted clearly by the latter.”
He argued that while exiting office, the Akufo-Addo government left light crude oil in stock, which Cenpower currently generates power with, while AKSA continued to take delivery of heavy fuel oil, which it generates power with.
“This fact is easily verifiable with a phone call to both power plants. The responsibility of the new administration is to not only procure more liquid fuel to keep the lights on, whenever liquid fuel becomes required to complement the gas supply but also to plan competently to avert power supply disruptions. We did it and they can do it too if they can.”
He continued, “The NDC government should get to work as we did, the reason we kept the lights on for eight years, regardless of the difficult times, and stop the needless finger-pointing. That is not the way we kept the lights on.”
Background
The Member of Parliament for Yapei Kusawgu Constituency, John Jinapor, on Tuesday sounded an alarm about a looming energy crisis allegedly caused by former President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
According to him, this is a result of a depleted national fuel for power generation ahead of a crucial WAPCo gas supply pipeline maintenance.
As a result, he foresees a serious load shedding exercise between 20th January to 16th February of about 1000 MW.
“Today, as President Mahama prepares to assume office, our checks from the system operator (GRIDCo), have revealed that Ghana has less than 2 days of stock for both Distillate Fuel and Heavy Fuel Oil (HFO) with no plans put in place by the outgoing administration to restock the depleting fuel stock despite assurances by government officials to the transition team.”
Contrary to the immediate past President’s assurance that the country’s energy sector had been competently managed with the lights kept on, the MP said near-collapse energy sector was what he had left behind.
“What the President conveniently chose not to tell Ghanaians was that the country’s fuel stock for our power plants has been depleted with no arrangements to replenish it. It is my honest belief that Ghanaians are discerning enough to know that this claim was false, mischievous, and an attempt to set the incoming Mahama administration up,” he said in a Facebook post.
According to him, President Mahama has inherited an “ailing” energy sector, which is on the verge of collapse from “mounting unsustainable” debt, high technical inefficiency, and poor governance.
“While at that, Mr Akufo Addo knew that his Ministry of Energy had requested WAPCo to reschedule its routine pipeline cleanup and inspection exercise originally scheduled for October 2024 to January 20th, 2025. Meanwhile, the outgoing Akufo Addo government refused to order liquid fuel to augment gas shortfall during the period of the maintenance and pigging exercise.”
This move, according to Jinapor was a “calculated ploy aimed at creating disaffection” for the incoming Mahama administration.
If crude is to be purchased by the new President, Jinapor put on record that it would take at least four weeks to order a parcel of Light Crude Oil (LCO) and another 4 weeks for the treatment of same before usage.
Source: opemsuo.com/Hajara Fuseini