St Anne’s Hospital made no attempts to pay GH¢4.8m debt – NEDCo justifies power cut
NEDCo’s decision to cut off power to the St. Anne’s Hospital in Damongo due to a GH4.8 million debt has been defended by the company’s corporate communications manager, Maxwell Kotoka.
In an interview with the media, Mr. Kotoka revealed that the Hospital ignored the notice it had provided to facilities under NEDCo’s control and had shown little interest in taking action when a disconnection exercise was announced.
When the hospital’s administration knew they couldn’t pay the debt on time, he claimed, they could have made a deal with the electricity company, but they didn’t.
“Needing the power which is so critical to their operation, where they have challenges, they should have engaged us, but they didn’t do that. And I heard them say that they owe GH¢4 million, they actually owe us GH¢4.8 million, and before we embarked on the disconnection, we made a public announcement that we were coming and said if you have any difficulty, you should take advantage of the notice before we get there,” Mr. Kotoka stressed.
Mr. Kotoka disclosed that NEDCo is open to engagements to find a lasting solution so that power can be restored to the Hospital.
“The hospital will testify that when we even came to disconnect, the disconnection wasn’t our best option, we wanted to engage on what we can do or what will be done about the continuous debt, but that didn’t yield results and so if there is a discussion on how to address this critical issue, why not?”
St Anne’s Hospital: 2 babies dead; three in critical condition over power cut
Two babies died while three more are in critical condition at St. Anne’s Hospital in Damongo on Monday, May 22, 2023, due to power disconnection to the facility by the Northern Electricity Distribution Company (NEDCo).
Power supply to the hospital was disconnected for the second time last Tuesday due to the facility’s failure to settle an outstanding electricity bill of over four million Ghana cedis.
The head of communications and clinical coordinator of the hospital Dr. Gbeadese Ahmed said the two babies were lost because of the inability of the hospital to get blood from the Blood Bank due to lack of power.
He added that due to the power situation, the hospital was also unable to test for compatible blood to transfuse to the babies.
