The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCO), ING. Ebenezer Kofi Essienyi has expressed worry over the activities of illegal miners popularly known as galamseyers on its lines.
The CEO made these remarks while addressing Journalists in Accra on Monday.
ING Ebenezer Kofi Essienyi said "Galamsey, I don't know whether the gold has started to form around the base of our towers. It has become a problem for us where galamseyers consciously dig under our lines"
He added that activities of the galamseyers compelled GRIDCO relocate its tower at an additional cost.
"The one that was there was working do well. Our linesmen working came to tell us that a tower is collapsing or some of the steel benders have been removed by the galamseyers"
"These infrastructures are there for our collective use so we have to protect them. Occasionally, as a power system, we normally have some challenges. Normally when you see the lines, you don't see the fire on them but they are extremely dangerous. We need to stay off the right off way"
"Occasionally we have transformer faults but we are making a conscious effort to put in a system so that if even we have a challenge with one transformer, customers would not experience it"
We are a developing country with limited resources and few people paying tax, we need to mobilise additional resources to move ourselves into that regime.
Old legacy lines
"We have to make a conscious effort to reconstruct them. They have over-lived their usefulness"
"We going through yhe motions call the PFM for us to reconstruct the Western corridor libes which was built in the 1960s"
Employment of women
The CEO disclosed that measures are been put in place to employ more women into the profession.
He was optimisic that employing women will help bridge the all-male dominated working environment.
"What men can do, women can also do it and even better. We are noted to saying linesmen in the line of our job but once we employ women, we can also say lineswomen"
Debt value owed by ECG and NEDCO
The CEO said "From my last count, I think it is about GHc2.7billion. That is what ECG and NEDCO owe GRIDCO"
Power supply to neighbours
"The national grid has some quantum of energy that has to be distributed. Whatever we send out is in excess of whatever we require"
He stressed that Ghana’s energy penetration is about 85% to 86% adding that "there are other places who do not have, it is extremely expensive to connect them to the grid"
The CEO noted that without the grid, there will be no light in Ghana.
Story by: Joshua Kwabena Smith
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