ECG Blames Mahama Taxes For Huge Tariffs

The Electricity Company of Ghana is blaming the recent huge electricity tariffs on the taxes imposed by the Mahama government, as well as the withdrawal of subsidies forced by the International Monetary Fund.

The national power supplier also insists its meters cannot be blamed for the increases, as the nation was being made to believe.

Last week, the New Statesman reported that the Mahama government was lying to Ghanaians with the impression it sought to create that it was not aware of what had led to the unusual increases in the electricity tariffs currently being paid by Ghanaians.

The past weeks had witnessed spirited public agitations over killer electricity bills, with many households having seen between 100-200 per cent in their charges, while some companies had also seen their bills up by over 1,000 per cent.

The Mahama government had blamed the outrageous tariffs on faulty meters and billing system, supposedly occasioned by anomalous software.

Officials of the ECG were even accused of being in ‘evil alliance’ with the opposition New Patriotic Party to make the government unpopular.

But now the truth is out, following a meeting between officials of the EC and members of the Mines and Energy Committee of Parliament, with the power supplier being exonerated of the charges of faulty billing.

The committee was tasked by the Speaker of Parliament to investigate the circumstances that had led to the huge bills, following complaints from the general public.

The ECG had come under an avalanche of attacks for what was supposed to be errors in its billing, leading to a ban being placed on the implementation of its new billing software by the PURC.

“The Commission after a thorough investigation into the matter through our monitoring exercises which culminated into visits to specific areas and also interrogation of bills which were presented to consumers by the Electricity Company of Ghana came to the conclusion that there was an anomaly in the initial implementation of the new billing software,” a statement from the PURC had claimed.

But it has now emerged that members of the parliamentary sub-committee, who were left nonplussed after their meeting with officials of ECG, were convinced that the power supplier could not be blamed for the huge increases in electricity tariffs, following presentations and clarifications from its officials.

According to the ECG, government's removal of subsidy on electricity and introduction of value added tax on commercial users are to be blamed for the hikes. These are all policies being implemented by the Mahama government as part of the conditionalities imposed by the International Monetary Fund.

This has been confirmed by members of the Mines and Energy Committee of Parliament, who say the high taxes by the Mahama government, other than faulty meters of the service provider, are the reasons for the unusual upward adjustment of bills.

According to the Member of Parliament for Effia Constituency in the Western Region, Joseph Cudjoe, all the claims leveled against the ECG have been found out to be false and not based on fact.

He was reported to have said that the impressions which were created on the floor of Parliament about ECG, and the subsequent branding of the company as the "bad boy", were all based on rumours.

For what had occasioned the current humongous electricity tariffs, Mr Cudjoe stated: “I can say for a fact that it is not a software issue."

So far as ECG is concerned, he added, its performance target in connection with billing as an operational issue is the best.

He said ECG was expected to achieve a minimum target of 98 percent, but the company was doing 99.9 per cent accuracy which he described as "par excellence."

"At the moment ECG says they are doing 99.9 per cent accuracy. Eight million bills sent out only 7,000 [were overbilled] and if you take it as a percentage, you get 99.9 per cent accuracy, so [only] 0.01 per cent [of consumers] have issues. And if you compare with its operations over the weekend, this period is even more accurate than what has been the case in the past. So, the issue has been isolated. Clearly the problem is the tariff and increases in the tariff that are causing the public outcry,” the MP said in a radio interview.

He added: "So, don’t attribute this to billing. That is the point I am making because as for billing accuracy, I am saying ECG has never done 100 per cent over the years. Don’t forget ECG is not a mill organisation. They don’t do 100 per cent billing accuracy, it is not even practical.”

The NPP last week accused the Mahama government of “just crying crocodile tears” by its sudden concern over the current situation that had persisted for five months, and further described the attempt to make the ECG the scapegoat as ludicrous.

The party raised the following concerns: Since the complaints and outcry over the electricity billing started in earnest from January 2016, is it now that it has come to government’s attention? How should Ghanaians place the explanation that came from ECG and PURC that the 70% announced increase was only an average and so the actual incidence of the percentage increase could be higher than the 70%? Did the electricity meters suddenly become faulty after the December 2015 tariff increments? Was the billing software changed after the new tariffs were imposed in December 2015? How about the charge from ECG that since 2014, about seventy thousand (70,000) "political" electricity meters have been installed, which meters are not billed?