Ex-Minister Links Dumsor To Corruption

A former Energy Minister under the erstwhile Kufuor administration, Joseph Kofi Adda, who brought an end to the power crisis in 2007, has attributed the more than three years energy crisis to corruption and greed, fuelled by incompetence.

The former Navrongo Central legislator said the worst crisis ever experienced by the country in its history was caused by an insensitive and sadistic joint Mills/Mahama administration whose preferred priority has been to make money for themselves and their cronies through corruption.

'This is the real reason for the nation relapsing into a debilitating energy crisis that has crippled the economy, weakened business and industry, resulted in the loss of lives and generally made life uncomfortable for Ghana,' he said.

The former energy minister told DAILY GUIDE that since 2007, an existing 436 megawatts of power that could have been utilised to avoid the crisis was not used, adding that with a limited importation of electricity from La Cote d'Ivoire, the four-year crisis could have been brought to an end years ago.

He stated further that this bitter experience surfaced in December 2010, May 2011 and February 2012 when the country went through three nationwide total blackouts, yet the insensitive and corrupt NDC government refused to allow the dual-fired 220 megawatts Alstom turbines imported by the Kufuor administration in 2008 to be installed at Kpone.

The NDC government, he added, also refused to utilise the 80MW Mines Reserve Plant, the 10MW Armed Forces Plant, as well as the 126MW Emergency Power Plant, all of which have been in the country since 2007.

According to Adda, all these plants were similar to what President Rawlings' government, of which President Mahama was a part, used to end the 1998 crisis and which President Kufuor also used later in 2007. He disclosed that those plants were currently being shipped off to Sierra Leone.

'All the NDC government needed to do was to procure diesel 30% the cost at which the Kufuor administration bought, and the nation would have immediately benefitted from 216MW of electricity,' Adda said.

He also added that if the Mills government, through their Energy Minister, had not stopped the installation of the Alstom turbines, the Kpone Thermal Power Plant would have been completed at the end of 2010 and the nation would have had an additional 220MW of electricity.

The former Navrongo Central legislator observed that the greedy and self-seeking interest of the NDC leadership delayed the completion of the project.

He disclosed that the NPP administration left behind a balance of over US$70 million from the 2007 Eurobond, which could have gone into the energy sector to improve the current power crisis, stressing, 'Indeed, what President Mahama needs to do is to fix the corruption in his government before he can begin to talk about fixing the energy challenge otherwise his promises are mere gimmicks.