The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG), has recovered GHȼ18.5 million owned by three state institutions.
The amount is part of a total of GHȼ46.9 million owned by Parliament, the Ghana Airport Company Limited and the state broadcaster, the Ghana Broadcasting Company – GBC.
Out of a total of GHȼ13 million owned by Parliament, the house has committed to the payment of GHȼ8.5 million to prevent disconnection, after an initial offer of one million cedis was rejected by the ECG. According to the Manager, External Communications of the ECG, Laila Abubakari, “GHȼ5 million of the GHȼ8.5 million they promised will be paid by the Finance Ministry through the GIFMIS platform. They have written us a check for the rest GHȼ3.5 million but we asked them to process it electronically because we are not accepting cheques or cash in this exercise.”
GACL
The taskforce later moved to the airport to retrieve some GHȼ28 million from the Ghana Airport Company Limited, owed in arrears.
The team, including the media practitioners, was met with resistance by the security for alleged “invasion” of their premises. The action of the security led to some agitations.
After a short meeting between the ECG and officials of the GACL, the latter made an upfront payment of GHȼ10 million. They have reached an agreement to pay the balance of GHȼ18 million in two weeks.
GBC
The day’s exercise was terminated at the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, who also owes the ECG an amount of GHȼ5.9 million.
According to the state broadcaster, the Ministry of Information had earlier reached an agreement with the Energy Ministry to pay the amount this year, after clearing some GHȼ17 million of the total debt last year.
The commitments from these state-owned institutions have led to no disconnection on the day.
The team resumes day two of the exercise tomorrow Tuesday, March 21, 2023, with visits to other state-owned institutions, in the next 30 days.
The part of the exercise on the state-owned institutions is led by a ECG national taskforce, and the power distributor says it is optimistic of recovering “100% of the entire GHȼ5.7 billion at the end of the nationwide exercise.”