The Electricity Company Ghana (ECG) has upscaled efforts to deal with illegal power consumers and to retrieve what they owe the company and institute possible legal action.In that regard, they have formed a National Revenue Protection Taskforce led by a Coordinator from the Ministry of Energy to unearth illegal connections in all ECG operational areas.
Ms. Sakyiwaa Mensah, ECG Tema Region Public Relations Officer, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview that, the task force was mandated to collect all debts owed the company. She said, “all ECG customers and governmental institutions including State-Owned Enterprises will be disconnected by the taskforce so long as their bills are in arrears as stipulated by the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) regulations”.
According to her, the ECG reserved the right to publish the names of customers whose bills were in arrears and advised customers to pay their bills to avoid embarrassment. She urged customers to inspect the Identification Cards of anyone or group of persons appearing as ECG task force officers and cooperate fully with the officials in the interest of the nation.
Ms Mensah encouraged the public to report any act of illegal connection to the nearest ECG office or call the task force at +233551444011 for an informant reward of 6 percent of the surcharge amount upon confirmation of the crime. She said the identities of the informants would remain strictly confidential
Meanwhile, Mr. Emmanuel Appoe, Tema Regional ECG Engineer, had reiterated that ECG, Tema Region had invested a total of GH¢989,800.00 in five major projects to improve reliable power supply to customers within its operational areas.
He said out of the total amount, GH¢142,141.92 was invested in the upgrading of undersized conductors serving Tema Community eight and its environs. The Tema Regional Office cover Tema, Nungua, Prampram, Afienya, Ashaiman, Ada, and Krobo districts.
Mr. Appoe in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, said the project was undertaken within the first half of the year 2021 and included the construction of links between two of their main overhead sub-transmission to benefit Tema Communities five, and eleven and parts of Community six.
Mr. Appoe who is the Acting General Manager of ECG Tema said the construction of the link made it possible for the transfer of load from one feeder to the other in case of repair works to ensure continuous power supply. He added that another project was the restoration of faulty underground sub-transmission link cables between two substations to ensure that Communities five, six, and ten get a better supply of power.
“In some areas, the Company realised that the load on the available transformers were getting too high, hence, resulting in low voltage to customers in the catchment area. Several transformers were added to the existing ones serving Power City and surrounding areas in Prampram, Community 19, and behind the Emef Estate,” he said.
The Company, he said was committed to its mission of providing safe, quality, and reliable electricity services to clients, therefore, the reason for investing heavily in the projects.
He urged developers, and the public to desist from encroaching on the right of way which might have electricity network installations saying doing so led to delays in case of faults repairing. He admonished the public against illegal connections which end up overloading ECG’s transformers.
“Illegal connections are one of the main reasons for transformer overloads, which leads to low voltages for consumers and sometimes, a total breakdown of the transformers, hence, plunging customers into outages till the transformers are replaced,” Mr. Appoe stated.
By Selasi Toklo
Source: GNA
