The Managing Director of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG), Samuel Dubik Mahama abruptly resigned from his post recently citing personal reasons as the cause of his resignation.
However, his reasons raised eyebrows as many did not believe the motive for his resignation. Many citied interferences in his work by some government officials, and also staff within the ECG who opposed his way of doing things in the prim and proper way.
Ranking Member on the Energy Committee of Parliament, John Abdulai Jinapor prior to the resignation of the ECG boss made a post, claiming Dubik Mahama was being forced out of office because he refused to kowtow to a cabal made up of President Akufo-Addo’s relatives.
In an interview with Randy Abbey on Metro TV, John Jinapor confirmed making the post. “I posted about 5 or 10 minutes before the announcement came out. Because I had got the information that some people related to the president insisted on purchasing light crude oil in a certain manner which Dubik resisted. This is because when the ECG and the other players in the energy sector appeared before the mines and energy committee in parliament in May/June, the cause of the load shedding then was inadequate fuel.
Because this govt hasn’t added any infrastructure to the gas processing plant they inherited. Now demand outplays the supply of gas so there is a deficit, so they have to procure light crude oil at the cost of 40million dollars every month, but that is not the problem.”
According to John Jinapor, the problem lies with who procures the light crude oil. Its been maintained that the Volta River Authority (VRA) be the lead agency in the generation sector to be responsible for the procurement of light crude oil for the other agencies.
“But when Ken Ofori Attah was Finance Minister, he insisted the procurement is done directly under his instructions and the ECG is mandated to pay directly without recourse to the cash waterfall mechanism. The PURC has been up in arms with the ECG because if they do that it is (payment for the light crude) no longer in line with the cash waterfall mechanism,” John Jinapor added.
He disclosed that the ECG boss recently decided to assert his authority and do what is right (go back to the mechanism where VRA purchased the light crude oil) “and that has led to the decision to kick him out. He wanted to revert to the cash waterfall mechanism,” he added.
