Month: July 2022

The Minister of Energy, Dr. M. Opoku Prempeh said there is so far no contract signed to relocate the Ameri Power Plant to Kumasi.

According to him, the nature of the contract is international in nature and would be brought before parliament before contract is signed.

Responding to a question posed by Dr. Kwabena Donkor, Member of Parliament for Pru East on Friday, July 1, 2022 on the total cost of relocation of the AMERI Plant to Kumasi area, The Minister said until negotiations are concluded and signed he cannot give any amount.

However, when it was brought to his attention that VRA said it would cost 35 Million, he said it good the figure is coming from VRA since they are leading the negotiation; and assured that the House would have the privilege of the fine details of the contract when discussions are concluded and brought to the House.

He revealed that this whole negotiation was led by VRA at the level of their Deputy Chief Executive in charge of Engineering till date; their lawyers, representatives from Ministry of Finance a representative from Energy Commission, including PURC all together ensuring that the plant would move to contribute to power stability and reliable power supply in this country.

He questioned by such a discussion could be described as opaque and in secrecy since it is known to them. “If it is opaque, how did they know, if it is shrouded in secret, who revealed it?”

He emphasized that the best decision is to allow Mytilineous International Trading Company to have the deal since they have been managing the plant all these while, adding that with the new arrangement 40 VRA staff would be involved in the management of the plant with only two external foreigners providing supervision.

Why Move the Plant to Kumasi

The decision for Ameri going to Kumasi according to the Minister was taken after the Ameri contract elapsed in January 2021, and the plant became fully that of Government of Ghana.

For over ten years Ghana Grid Company and the Volta River Authority in their grid stability exercises study show that the weakest link in the whole Ghana National Transmission System is Ashanti.

They suffer the worst voltages in the country and they suffer from more interruptions anywhere else in the country. So GRIDCO and VRA both approached that we should start relocating generational plants in Kumasi and further up north going forward because that is where they have the problem, he stated.

So when it happened that Ameri plant became available, the decision then was taken to start a third generation plant in Kumasi. “I can tell you that since that decision was taken by government, it is not only Ameri that is going to Kumasi, as at now ECG is negotiating to have two other power plants that they have already operations in Ghana also going to Kumasi. Not only that, VRA itself is relocating one of its own plants – the Mine Reserve Plant to Kumasi. So it was not a decision taken for and on behalf of Ameri. It is a decision taken for and on behalf of stable electricity system in the country”.

He said VRA didn’t have the money and they have a lot of plants that are lying idle that they are struggling to find money including the T-3. So we needed to find the money to relocate it.

For him, if the issue is about the cost, the cost is not different from other companies that expressed interest in doing that. “So we did invite people and we found out that the best to give it to is those who were operating the plant; if they can find the money to relocate the plant to operate it for a number of years based upon which they put in money. So the cost of 35million, they are going to operate the plant for 3 years and in that 3 years train VRA to take over the plant”.

According to him, the Plant as currently in Aboadze has no VRA trained staff so if government has decided to give it to VRA, there is nobody in VRA now who understands the plant, who was part of management of the plant for the past five years that it operated.

Ghanamps.com

The Member of Parliament for Bolgatanga Central believes government is not really prepared to undergo any IMF program as put out by the Information Minister, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah on Friday, July 1, 2022.

Mr. Kojo Oppong Nkrumah in a statement on Friday said “the President of the Republic, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has authorized Finance Minister Ken Ofori Atta to commence formal engagements with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), inviting the Fund to support an economic program put together by the government of Ghana.
However, Mr. Isaac  Adongo is sure government does not have any program to put to the table for negotiation.

“This has been the most sensible decision to have been taken a year ago, but the ego of these people made it almost impossible to take the right decision.

It is still a very long process to arrive at a program. Unfortunately, they are beginning to engage at a time that they are not even prepared to have anything on the table for IMF to consider”.

According to him, unlike the NPP, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government before going to IMF had a working document which the IMF helped to improve and adopted.
“You recall the Sechi consensus provided a working document through which government could negotiate from the position of strength because we knew what we want. These guys are going to the IMF at a time they basically don’t have anything; no blue print, so chances are that we are going to have a lot of the program being designed from the perspective of the IMF and not the perspective of the country”.

He also believes government has already started on a wrong foot with the involvement of the Finance Minister, Mr. Ken Ofori Atta. “But i want to make the point that they have already started on a faulty leg; asking Ken Ofori Atta to engage IMF is equivalent to telling the IMF we don’t want a program”.

According to him, Ken Ofori Atta lacks the capacity and does not fit for this type of purpose, and added that Ken Ofori Atta should be fire immediately with that communiqué in order to give assurance and comfort to the negotiating party that Ghana is serious at having a program. “Charles Adu Boahen should follow him too”.

He said the Ministry of Finance at this time needs a complete upgrade from the people who are currently sitting there in order that we would have a credible leadership to engage the IMF and come out with a program that is a workable program.

“Unfortunately, he is the same man who the president has directed to engage the IMF to go and say what. That we are no more a sovereign country; that we are no more a proud nation that the people who said we should go to IMF are no more naysayers that he is now the naysayer because he has come? So the president is playing games; he seems not to understand the doldrums that they plunged this economy.

I would wish that the government shows clear commitment that it is ready to have an IMF program and that would be to the benefit of the people of Ghana, and that we are putting our best foot forward”.
The man they have asked to go and negotiate with IMF should not be nearer any process of negotiation. He and Charlse Adu Boahen are the reasons we are where we are, and the president would give himself a chance at having a program that is acceptable to all stakeholders if Ken Ofori Atta and Charles Adu Boahen are announced as not being ministers by mid-day today. In the absence of that we are still playing gimmicks and we are still playing games with the emotions of Ghanaians, he emphasized.

According to him, in the absence of a working document, negotiation would be very tough because “you yourself you don’t know what you want.

He said with the Senchi Consensus, “the IMF could work with us to improve that document and give us a program that is 60-70 percent our program. Now that we are going with empty hands, whose program would it be; IMF program or our program?
It also prolongs the period of negotiation because you don’t know what you want and the IMF now has to dictate to us what program we should run”.

Mr Adongo also minced no words in reminding the public that a lot of government’s flagship programs would go.

“Those useless programs would go; in fact the reason why we are here, and i wish i would have a conversation with Bawumia. This is the man who said one village, one dam and you grabbed it and budgeted for it; so they should still come and continue digging of dug-outs which are of no use, it would go. He is the man who said one million per constituency and you grabbed it and set up three development authorities to compete with district assemblies; you have pumped 1.3billion a year for the past four years into a useless program, no way, it would go so that our local governance system, local government assemblies that have the expertise would work, and not a parallel system that is only draining our resources”.

He, however, assured that social intervention programs like LEAP and School Feeding program would be sustained while those that need targeting would also be done. “But of course LEAP would not go, school feeding would not go because IMF would automatically protect and provide social safety net for the poor”.

Dominic Shirimori/Ghanamps.com

The Criminal Court 3 on Friday, July 1, 2022 acquitted and discharged the National Democratic Congress Member of Parliament for Twifo Atti Morkwa, in the Central Region, David T. Vondee of any wrong doing.

Mr. Vondee was accused and dragged to court for allegedly using his construction firm, Klenam Construction Ltd to defraud a businessman of $2.4 million in a land deal located at Frafraha in the Adentan Municipality in the Greater Accra Region between August 2015 and July 2016 under the guise of selling a tract of land to a private company called REI Ghana Limited.

Prosecutors charged Vondee with defrauding by false pretence contrary to Section 13(1) of the Criminal Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29) for allegedly making a false representation that his construction company had title to the land.
On the offence of money laundering contrary to Section 1 (2) (c) of the Anti-Money Laundering Act, 2020 (Act 1044), prosecutors accused the MP of taking possession of the $2.4 million when he (Vondee) knew it was proceeds of crime.
Addressing the Parliamentary press corps after his acquittal and discharge by the court, Mr. Vondee said “I am here this morning to announce to the press that by the greatest grace of God and thanks to the court after interrogating the witnesses of the state and the prosecutors and so on and so forth, myself and my lawyer Edudzi Tameklo Godwin we thought that we had performed beyond reasonable doubt to actually announce our innocence to the court and so we put in a submission of no case.

This morning the court acquitted and discharged me of any wrong doing”.

I thought it is very important as a member of parliament and for the good people of Twifo Atti Morkwa to speak to the press because this matter truly engaged the attention of the entire country and that if this matter is dealt with in this manner, it is just proper to talk to the press, he stated.
Ghanamps.com