John Peter Amewu- Energy Minister
The Chamber of Independent Power Producers and Bulk Consumers [CIPDIB] has hinted Ghanaian power consumers of a possible power outages in the next few days, if the Power Distribution Services (PDS) fails to pay its huge financial debt to the Independent Power Producers (IPPs).
A statement issued and signed by the Chief Executive Officer of CIPDIB, Elikplim Kwabla Apetorgbor, urged the government through the Ministry of Energy to compel PDS to expressly pay all accumulated invoices to the IPPs within the seven days.
The statement further urged the government to not only make PDS pay its debts to the IPPs; but also be made to pay interest on all overdue invoices which the IPPs could have profitably utilized.It also called on Millennium Development Authority (MiDA) to compel PDS to adhere to best business practices and respect the terms of the PPAs and ensure the nation derive the optimum benefit from the concession arrangement.
The leadership of CIPDIB emphatically stated that “should PDS fail to respect the terms of the PPA and make payment to the IPPs within the 7-8 working days period; our members would be left with no choice than to shut down PDS’s plants as they could not continue to be saddled with huge debts”.
Meanwhile, the Power Distributions Services took over some operations and management of Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) from March 1, 2019 with the expectation to deliver a more quality service to power consumers than its host, ECG.