The opposition New Patriotic Party is accusing the John Mahama led government of misleading Ghanaians on the power crisis that has bedeviled\u00a0the nation.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”i9H2jiCqEFbrBZu8ynlUwqvR2RjaSwQx”]They made the accusation in a press conference held in Accra on Tuesday in response to an earlier press conference held by the\u00a0Power Minister, Kwabena Donkor.<\/p>\n
The Power Minister among other things, announced that the power crisis would be resolved by the end of 2015 following a number of initiatives being implemented by government.<\/p>\n
He said,\u00a0\u201cTo this end the Ministry is working on different Emergency Power arrangements to shore up the supply situation. These arrangements will eventually increase our generation capacity by about 1,000MW in the short term and ultimately provide us the platform to pursue the medium to long-term solutions. We are hopeful that these measures will stabilize the situation,\u201d the minister added.<\/p>\n
The General Secretary of the NPP, Kwabena Agyepong who addressed the press conference questioned \u201chow is government going to fund such projects, especially so when it was not captured in the 2015 budget which was read on the floor of Parliament by the Minister of Finance, Mr. Seth Tekper.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe believe that the John Mahama led government is being insincere and misleading the Ghanaian people. The actions and inactions of government have weakened the financial capacity of VRA. As we speak, Government, MMDAs and other institutions owe VRA up to the tune of over GHC2 billion and we strongly believe it is the major contributor to what we are experiencing today in Ghana.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also called on government to provide details of the short-term measures being put in place and clear timelines for the completion of the power projects.<\/p>\n
The NPP scribe also lamented how \u201cthe energy crisis is taking a heavy toll on the socio economic lives of Ghana\u201d adding \u201cthe load shedding is destroying small and medium enterprises. Big companies are downsizing therefore increasing job loses and unemployment.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we demand now are pragmatic plans in fixing this unending power crisis in the shortest possible time.\u00a0Barbers, hairdressers, carpenters, tailors, students and everybody have been negatively affected. Now we are being told to wait until the election year of 2016 to see an end to the crises.\u00a0A few weeks ago, the fate of patients was left in the balance when the lights went off at the LEKMA hospital. Doctors were then in the operating theater performing a procedure on patients. Blood in blood banks are at risk due to frequent outages.\u00a0 Bodies of loved ones are decomposing in our morgues.\u00a0What plans does the government have for our hospitals, clinics and health institutions?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0–<\/p>\n
By: Godwin Allotey Akweiteh\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n