The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has defended the establishment of \u00a0a committee to oversee the collection of unpaid bills owed by consumers.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is a clear directive backed by the government for us to do that and this is more efficient than what we used to have \u2013 the normal team. It\u2019s not the same,\u201d said the Public Relations Officer of the ECG, William Boateng.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”jW3qu0J4JROEoeMFhWWAhF5jOLzYkYEu”]The Power Minister has set up a committee<\/strong><\/span><\/a>\u00a0 to retrieve all outstanding monies\u00a0owed \u00a0the \u00a0electricity company.<\/p>\n This is aimed at injecting money into the operations of the power distributor and also enable the ECG settle\u00a0its debts to the various power producers.<\/p>\n The Power Minister, Dr.Kwabena Donkor said the huge unpaid debt by power consumers was rapidly collapsing the ECG and \u00a0the committee was formed to avert the situation.<\/p>\n However, the move has received some backlash from the African Center for Energy Policy (ACEP) who have described the work of the committee as a waste of time<\/strong><\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n ACEP\u2019s Executive Director, Dr. Amin Adams in an earlier interview with Citi News said the Power Minister is better placed to get the government to pay its debts since it is the biggest debtor of the ECG.<\/p>\n But ECG\u2019s, William Boateng explained that the committee is a more effective tool to get debtors to pay.<\/p>\n According to him, task forces will be set up at the regional and district levels and the committee will have the oversight responsibility by ensuring the task forces effectively undertake their mandate \u201cwithout any excuse whatsoever.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Boateng also disclosed that the committee will \u201cdeploy some of our workers from other departments to join the disconnection team so that we will beef up the numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n He was certain that the committee will help the company retrieve the over GHC 500 million owed it.<\/p>\n \u201cWe buy the power from our suppliers so we will have to make sure we pay them. they bill us weekly and over the years, we are unable to pay them fully and that means we are also accumulating debt,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n By: Efua Idan Osam\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana
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