The Co-chair of the Ghana Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (GHEITI), Dr Steve Manteaw, has said the newly commissioned Ameri Plant in Kumasi will be useless if there is no money to buy fuel.
Known as the Kumasi 1 Thermal Power Plant (K1TPP), President Nana Akufo-Addo on Wednesday commissioned the facility at Anwomaso in the Ashanti region.
The project is expected to boost power supply in the middle and the northern sector of the country.
Speaking on Adom FM’s morning show Dwaso Nsem Thursday, Dr Mantaew said generation shortfall has been the biggest bane of Ghanaians when it comes to power supply.
This, he explained, is due to the lack of funds to purchase fuel to get the plants running, hence the erratic power supply.
“In 2014 and 2015, the power crisis we went through was due to financial problems because the NDC said they were contracting more generation plants. They brought Karpowership and Ameri, among others but the plants alone do not solve the problem. Dumsor will still be there if you don’t have money to buy fuel,” he said.
A memorandum of understanding signed in 2015 between the government of Ghana and Africa Middle East Resources Investment Limited (AMERI) birthed this project in 2016.
AMERI Power Plant was to provide 5 years power for Ghana to address the power fluctuations in the country at a cost of $459m.
The relocation and renaming of the AMERI Power Plant came with many backlash and criticisms from political parties, concerned groups and individuals as they deemed it needless and a waste of resources.
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