Senior Staff of Volta River Authority has flooded the headquarters of VRA in red and black to protest the immediate withdrawal proposed Ghana Hydro Authority Bill.
The bill which aims to merge the Volta River Authority (VRA) with other entities, a move the staffs reject.
Speaking to JoyNews, a Senior Staff Association Chairman, Theophilus Tetteh described the bill as a deliberate attempt by the government to privatize the VRA and hand it over to the private sector players.
“We know the modus operandum of this, there was a committee that was set by the Ministry of Energy to look at the technical feasibility, the committee was clear in their recommendations to the ministry, and even the terms of reference to the committee is to create a thermal authority out of Volta River Authority and eventually sell it off so it is not that we are saying it”. Theophilus Tettey stated.
Mr. Tetteh however warned of severe consequences for electric consumer in the country if the bill is not redrawn.
He said, “currently we have 50 percent and 50 percent IPPs, the IPPs are paid what we call take or pay. Even if their plants are shut down and are not running ECG will have to pay them. In the case of VRA it is take and pay, what it means is that what you produce into the system is what you will be paid for. If your plants are down nobody pays you for that and that is even a cost to the consumer, if we go to that end, we will be paying for power we have not consumed. The effect will be on the Ghanaian consumer and businesses in the country”.
Meanwhile, Chairman of VRA Senior Association in Accra Samuel Aban questioned why the VRA is being labelled as inefficient he argued that instead of selling off the authority under the pretense of creating a new authority, the government should focus paying it debts to the VRA.
