Some of the journalists
The Western Regional Office of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has organized a training workshop for about 20 media personnel in the region on the operations of the company.
The programme was to help journalists understand the operations of the power distribution company.
The media personnel were educated on the production of power by the Volta River Authority (VRA), transmission of electricity by the Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) and finally the distribution by the ECG before power reaches individual households and businesses in the region.
Philip Osei Bonsu, the Regional Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the ECG, explained that the education of the media personnel was crucial because the media acts as an interface between the company and the public.
“Journalist play crucial role in telling the stories of what our engineers do daily to ensure power in our homes and businesses. It also helps clear some misconceptions as well,” he added.
He stated that “in the times of load-shedding, some members of the public accuse ECG engineers of just sitting somewhere and pressing knobs just to plunge people into darkness, but after the programme the journalists have realized that that is not possible.”
He pointed out that educating the media on the ECG’s operations would help make our work more open and transparent to our customers.”
Jacqueline Ofori-Atta, the Regional Manager of the ECG, urged journalists to get acquainted with issues they cover in order to send the right message to the public.
Ebenezer Ghunney, Regional Engineer of ECG, told journalists that ECG’s bulk distribution stations receive power from GRIDCo and the company uses its transformers to step down the high voltage along the distribution network to ensure efficient distribution of power.
The participants later visited one of the sub-stations of ECG in Takoradi to obtain first-hand information.
The EGC staff at sub-station explained the functions of the numerous equipment to the media personnel.
From Emmanuel Opoku, Takoradi