The Minister for Energy and Green Transition, John Abdulai Jinapor, has stated that Ghana does not need directives from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) before taking the right decisions to ensure the sustainability of the country’s power sector.
According to him, although Ghana’s programme with the IMF requires periodic electricity tariff adjustments, the country must prioritise responsible policy choices that will strengthen the energy sector and guarantee reliable electricity supply.
“Whether it is an IMF conditionality or not, we must learn to do what is right and proper. We don’t need the IMF to come and tell us that we should do what is right and proper,” the Minister said.
He made the remarks at the official launch of the 2025–2029 Corporate Strategy of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) at Electro-Volta House in Accra, on Tuesday.
The event brought together major stakeholders in the energy sector, including officials from the Volta River Authority, Ghana Grid Company, the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission, the Energy Commission and the State Interests and Governance Authority, alongside ECG board members, management, union leaders and staff.
The strategy outlines ECG’s transformation agenda for the next five years, aimed at strengthening operational efficiency, improving financial sustainability and enhancing customer service within the electricity distribution sector.
Mr. John Jinapor explained that discussions about electricity tariffs should not be reduced to whether the IMF programme requires adjustments, but rather whether the policies adopted ensure the long-term viability of the power sector.
He cautioned that past decisions to announce tariff reductions without properly funding the associated subsidies created financial pressures for institutions within the energy value chain.
“We can pretend, like what was done in 2018, to announce a reduction in electricity tariff, but when that reduction was announced, payment was not made. It sits in your books,” he said.
The Energy Minister added that inefficiencies in revenue mobilisation also affect electricity tariffs, since failure to collect bills force paying consumers to shoulder the cost of unpaid electricity.
“If you do not collect what is due, then it means that some few people have to pay for what others are not paying for and that makes the tariff high,” he stated.
He further emphasised that government institutions must treat electricity as an essential service that must be paid for, just like other operational expenses.
“They budget to buy cars. They budget to buy food. They budget to pay telephone bills or whatever. They should buy electricity. It is not free for government agencies,” he stressed.
Mr. Jinapor also attributed some of the power outages experienced across the country to years of underinvestment in critical infrastructure, particularly transformers within the electricity distribution network.
According to him, many transformers have become obsolete and overloaded due to increasing electricity demand.
To address the situation, he disclosed that government had secured support from the Ministry of Finance to procure and deploy about 1,500 transformers to strengthen the distribution network and reduce localised outages.
Earlier, the Acting Managing Director of ECG, Julius Kpekpena, said strategic planning had guided the company’s operations since 1988 and remains central to its ability to respond to changing demands in the power sector.
He explained that the previous corporate strategy covering the period 2021 to 2024 had ended, making it necessary to introduce a new framework to reposition the company for sustainable growth. Mr. Kpekpena acknowledged that ECG faced several operational challenges at the end of the previous strategy cycle, including inadequate revenue collection, high system losses and rising upstream costs.
He said management implemented reforms in 2025 to stabilise the company’s operations, strengthen financial discipline and improve transparency through enterprise-wide digital systems.
According to him, these measures have already produced results, with the company recording a 40 percent increase in revenue collection and a 50 percent reduction in overhead costs.
Providing further details of the new strategy, Director for Projects, Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation at ECG, Charles Obeng, explained that the plan builds on decades of structured strategic management within the organisation.
He noted that ECG has relied on corporate planning frameworks since 1988, evolving over time to incorporate modern management tools such as the balanced scorecard methodology and objectives and key results systems to improve accountability and performance monitoring.
Mr. Charles Obeng said the new strategy was developed through extensive consultations with internal stakeholders and institutions within the energy sector value chain.
He indicated that the strategy is built around six strategic themes: corporate governance and institutional strengthening, customer engagement and experience, operational efficiency and infrastructure optimisation, human capital development, risk management and compliance, and revenue maximisation and diversification.
According to him, ECG identified seventy-nine initiatives to be implemented within the five-year period, with projects scheduled across short, medium and long-term timelines.
He added that the overarching goal is to transform ECG into a competitive, sustainable, innovative and customer-centric energy service provider by 2029 through disciplined execution, collaboration and strong accountability across the organisation.
For more news, join The Chronicle Newspaper channel on WhatsApp: https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VbBSs55E50UqNPvSOm2z
