The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has cautioned the public against engaging private electricians to restore power for them anytime they experience an outage.
According to the power distributor, these electricians illegally access poles, fuse transformers with substandard fuses and transfer customers from one phase to another.
Addressing the media, Ing. George Amoah, General Manager for Ashanti West, ECG, indicated that the actions of these electricians are illegal, and often lead to outages, low voltage, power fluctuations and damaged transformers.
“When these electricians visit our substations, they cause a lot of disruptions within our network including using substandard materials to fuse a transformer which often damage the transformer. Currently, their actions are destroying our transformers and causing outages and low voltage to our customers as they swap phases for customers and end up overloading a particular phase”, he stated.
Ing. Amoah cited an incident that came to light during a recent community engagement with residents of Dabaa in the Atwima Nwabiagya North District of the Ashanti Region where residents admitted to engaging the services of a private electrician anytime they experienced an outage.
The residents indicated that the electrician charged them GHc150 anytime he climbed a pole.
“Regular load monitoring revealed that the electrician had transferred a lot of customers onto the red phase, hence overloading that phase of the transformer. Our team had to do load balancing quickly to prevent that transformer from being damaged”, he added.
According to Ing. Amoah, it is not even safe for electricians to operate within ECG network without permit or authorization as they could be electrocuted.
“Our system is a ring system which enables us to supply customers from different feeders in the wake of an outage so an electrician illegally climbing a pole to rectify a problem might think there is no power in the conductors (electricity lines), meanwhile we will be supplying from a different feeder which could electrocute the electrician”, he explained.
Ing. Amoah added that anyone who wants to work within ECG network including ECG engineers always apply for permit which must be approved before he or she can carry out any work in the network.
He bemoaned the adverse effects of the illegal operations by these electricians on the financial health of the company as ECG spends a lot of money to replace damaged transformers and lose revenue from unserved energy anytime their actions cause outages to customers.
“Recently, we lost a 33kV transformer at Boussie in our Suame District which caused customers to experience an outage for a while and investigations revealed that some electricians had tampered with the transformer. We replaced the transformer with a 200 kVA transformer at a cost of GHc 110,000 which could have been used to extend power supply to areas without electricity”, he added.
The ECG General Manager also revealed that the company was concerned about the rise in the vandalization of ECG installations like transformers, poles, pylons and cables by some individuals.
“These individuals pretend to be ECG workers to gain access and deliberately destroy ECG installations to steal essential components, which often leads to disruption of power supply to our cherished customers”, he added.
This activity is gaining momentum in the Region and has become rampant within the Adum Central Business District, Abinkyi, Kaase and other areas. These individuals have been stealing fuse links and the plates covering RMUs and Extensible switches at Adum old Melcom and Abinkyi.
They even destroyed the Distribution Pillar (DP) of a transformer at Abinkyi last month. The Company is forced to replace these materials almost every week especially within the Adum enclave.
He enlightened the public that only ECG staff are authorized to operate ECG installations and can be identified by their staff ID Cards, branded ECG reflector vests, helmets, vehicles and safety apparel.
“The company has the authority to prosecute persons engaged in such illegal acts within ECG network by an Executive Instrument (EI) 38 of the Appointment of Public Prosecution Instrument (2010) and will not hesitate to do so once apprehended, so all individuals involved in such illegal acts should desist from it”, he warned.
Ing. Amoah advised customers to desist from engaging private electricians anytime they experience an outage and contact ECG via the contact center on 0302611611, report to the nearest ECG office, lodge a complaint on the ECG PowerApp or reach the company via social media handles @ECGghOfficial on Facebook, X, or Instagram for prompt intervention.
He further implored customers and the general public to be vigilant and help protect ECG installations in their localities by reporting any suspicious individual to the nearest police station or any ECG office.
By Benjamin Aidoo
