Dr. Kwabena Donkor, the National Democratic Congress’ (NDC) member of parliament for Pru East, has disputed various claims made by the World Bank Country Director regarding electricity deals done while the NDC was in office.
Former and present administrations have been charged of performing a bad job of finalizing power purchase agreements negotiated between 2012 and 2023, according to World Bank Country Director Pierre Frank Laporte.
The then-minister of power for the Mahama government, who signed several of the power plant deals, asserts that Mr. Laporte’s statements are untrue and are not supported by adequate study.
“I am just pointing out that he did not do proper research. Either he did not do proper research or as it is usual with the World Bank, a government in power does no wrong. It is only when the government exits that the World Bank comes out with all sorts of misgivings about their performance,” he said.
Speaking on Accra-based JoyFM, he claimed that because of the dollar’s substantial influence on contracts and agreements, the ratio was the same as it was at the time of signing.
“Power is a very dollar-dependent sector, it is so dollar dependent. If you take the exchange rate of 1st January 2017, the exchange rate was 4.14 pesewas to the dollar. Today, the exchange rate is Gh¢11.193 pesewas to the dollar,” he said.
Dr Donkor stressed that he was surprised about the assertion by the World Bank Country Director because some of the thermal plant deals under their tenure were the cheapest.
“The Ameri power plant is the cheapest thermal plant in terms of tariffs in Ghana today.”
Source: myjoyonline
