A security analyst, Nana Owusu Sekyere says the erratic power supply which hit the nation Wednesday night poses a security threat.
According to him, the situation provided a perfect environment for armed robbers to carry out their criminal activities.
Majority of Ghanaians went to bed without power Wednesday night after what appeared to be a nationwide blackout hit the West African nation. The lights went off around 9:pm.
The last time a nationwide blackout hit Ghana was in January 2016 as a result of system failure.
But it is with this failure that the security expert said if the unfortunate act was deliberate then there is a cause to be alarmed.
He added that, regardless, if it isn’t mere malfunctioning of electrical equipment then a thorough yet rapid investigation must be conducted to ascertain the cause of the major power cut.
“The blackout had social economic implications and would have been a perfect opportunity for any adversary that had criminal plans. If it was deliberate or planned then it means that the adversary had created the atmosphere to take advantage of that to perpetuate their organized crime…”
“If it’s a deliberate act then we have an issue, but if it’s not and it’s just malfunctioning of equipment then we need to do thorough rapid investigations to ascertain what actually happened…” he maintained.
According to Mr Owusu Sekyere, the government needs to place security measures as one of the priorities guarding the country against terrorist attacks hence there is the need to have alternative measures against total black out.
He further advised the security personnel to devoid of sleep when such occurrences come into play since they are to keep the country from harm for peace to prevail.
“VRA is the powerhouse of Ghana. Practically, if you take VRA out we have nothing. If an adversary or a terrorist drops one missile in VRA then it means we are finished. It shuts down. These are some of the things we should be thinking about.”
“I feel sad that those supposed to protect us were asleep. How safe are we? These aren’t petty issues, they are very serious. We need to have security conscious solutions. We need to be actually looking at security as a front burner. The problem is I always think that some of us need to engage those in the security sector to see how they can be addressed…” he addressed.