The Minister of Energy, John Peter Amewu has said the recent power outages in Ghana cannot be attributed to financial issues as the sector has enough monetary backing to generate power for the country.

This is contrary to assertions that the recent power outages are due to the government’s inability to procure fuel for power generators to produce electricity for consumption.

Member of Parliament for the Bongo Constituency and a former Head of Communications at the Energy Ministry, Edward Bawa had earlier made a claim that the country’s energy sector is confronted with severe financial challenges coupled with unprecedented net arrears of about US$4 billion and indebtedness of US$1.5 billion owed private power producers.

Energy Minister John Peter Amewu denied any financial challenges in his sector. He also debunked assertions that the country was back into its dreaded electricity power insufficiency era (Dumsor).

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“I can assure you that, a lot of measures have been put in place for the stable supply of power. I want to get to my room and see the lights on if once a while you witness light outs, it has nothing to do with power generations…Dumsor is a thing of the past. This is what someone has done to this country and we must make sure we move from it”.

” We have learned from the negative past and then build on to achieve something significant. We are not in the era of Dumsor, we are in the era of progressive regime and era of effective energy industry management and era where we want to make sure energy becomes the engine of growth to trigger the growth of this economy.” He added.

Earlier this week, the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo)  said the prolonged power outages experienced in parts of the country is due to a performance test on a new regulating and metering gas station in Tema.

GRIDCo added that some plants in Aboadze experienced gas flow challenges, hence the inability to generate power.

GRIDCo in a statement said the challenges have been resolved with power restored to all affected bulk supply points today [Tuesday].

“The Ghana Grid Company wishes to inform the general public that on Monday, March 16, 2020, the West Africa Gas Pipeline (WAGPCo) undertook a scheduled performance test on a new regulating and metering gas station in Tema. This led to limited gas supply to power plants in the Tema enclave.

"Additionally, some plants in the Aboadze enclave also experienced gas flow challenges; making them unable to generate power. These two incidents led to disruptions in the available generation, resulting in prolonged power outages in parts of the country yesterday.”