"I take the blame" – Amewu apologizes to Ghanaians for two weeks power cuts

General News on Thursday, November 29, 2018

Source: adomonline.com

2018-11-29

Energy Minister John Peter Amewu has asked Ghanaians to pardon him as well as the government led by Nana Akufo-Addo for the intermittent power cuts that struck the country there are at least two weeks.

By baduring the country that the worst temporary power cuts have been completed, he apologized to Ghanaian businesses and households who were embarrbaded by the situation.

"As a government and energy minister, I want to apologize to the Ghanaians," he told the MultiTV news program PM Express on Wednesday.

He said his department is putting in place long-term measures to prevent this from happening again.

"Of course, as a minister, I am responsible. I take the blame. But I want to badure them that this is due to a number of events that have occurred and that it has nothing to do with financial problems.

"It has nothing to do with the planning system, but it's a mere coincidence of events that occurred as a result of unexpected contingencies," he said.

The plants operate

He stated that the power was sufficient to meet the demand, refuting the minority's proposals to Parliament that financial difficulties in the sector would only worsen the situation.

"Karpower, for example, can produce 450 MW, but less than 450 MW. It is about 40 MW. Asogli is about 94 MW starting today. Akosombo can do as much as 900 MW, Akosombo is about 700 MW now. There is therefore much more room for expansion if demand exceeds supply. We are responding to demand, "he said.

He said that no electricity consumer in the country should be deprived of electricity because power plants can provide to meet the demand.

"People can be disturbed by the fact that there are technical problems – intermittently; what can happen when a transmitter goes off or there is a problem in a region, it is possible that we meet pockets of these things in some areas of the country that I can not tell you.

"But these shortcomings, in terms of intermittent breakdowns, are not due to the unavailability of production to cope with them. We have enough generations to meet the demand. So, when electricity is collected over the network, transmitted and distributed along that part, if there is a distribution problem, it has nothing to do with the problems of production and of transmission. That's what we are trying to solve, "said the energy manager.