The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) is negotiating with the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) to offset about GH₵600 million of its tax obligations to the state.
The GRA intends to write off the debt of some “sensitive” public sector institutions that have accumulated over the years.
Samuel Dubik Mahama, the Managing Director, ECG, who disclosed this in an interview, said the amount would still not be enough “as we owe GRA over a billion Ghana cedis in taxes.”
ECG has so far retrieved about Gh₵2.5 billion out of GH¢5.7 billion debt it intends to recover from a month-long revenue mobilisation exercise.
The exercise, which started on March 20, 2023, and ends on April 20, 2023, targets domestic users, businesses, organisations, Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDA).
Mr Mahama urged customers to take the proactive steps of paying deposits in anticipation of bills that may be delayed due to technical reasons.
He said the differences would be reconciled when the next bill for the customer was prepared.
He bemoaned the use of fake meters leading to a high loss of revenue due to the inability of the service provider to capture and bill power consumed.
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“ECG is the only company that is supposed to provide these meters, but some people have found a way of bringing these meters into the market. By the continuous use of these meters by people not on the ECG network, that means our customer numbers are wrong,” he said.
Mr Mahama warned customers against illegal connections and indicated that the company would begin another exercise after the revenue mobilisation exercise to fish out culprits.
“And our intention with that is to punish them by charging them with stealing,” he said.