The Executive Secretary of the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC), Dr Shafic Suleman, has paid a four-day working visit to the Western Region.
The tour, which ended on Monday, afforded Dr Suleman to pay courtesy calls on the regional management of Ghana Water Limited (GWL), the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and Twin City Energy.
The visit, which also took the PURC boss to some Corporate Social Responsibility projects (Pro-poor water project) sites undertaken by the PURC at Mampong Nkran, Abasaa and Apremdo, to enhance the collaboration between the PURC and the regulated utilities.
The Ghana Water Limited (GWL) team, led by Chief Manager, Mr Richard Esoun, briefed the Executive Secretary on their performance and challenges, some of which included, non-payment of water bill, theft of water meters, damages to their transmission and distribution pipelines by road contractors as well as the pollution their raw water and siltation of the intake points.
The Chief Manager, ECG, Western Region, Mr Emmanuel J. Ofori, also briefed Dr Suleman on their performance for 2024 and mentioned their main challenge to include the influx of foreign or illegal meters with their operational area, illegal connections and non-payment of bills.
The Executive Secretary, on his part, emphasised the need for GWL to be proactive in their service delivery.
He commended the ECG for their performance but urged them to continue the upgrades and improvements in the electricity distribution network to enhance service reliability and also boost consumer confidence and their willingness to pay their electricity bills.
Dr Suleman also advised ECG to improve their revenue collection and also to regularise meters that had not been captured in the system.
On recent tariff adjustments, he mentioned that utility consumers would expect improved quality of service delivery stressing that “quality of service remains central to PURC’s regulatory mandate and we do more to monitor services delivered by ECG to their customers.”
At Amandi Thermal Power Plant (Twin City Energy), Dr Suleman assured them of PURC’s commitment to ensuring regular payments to Independent Power Producers to sustain reliable power generation.
He disclosed that the tour had provided his team valuable firsthand insights into the region’s utility landscape, noting that, these observations would inform regulatory decisions to improve service delivery across Ghana’s utility sector.
The Dr Suleman’s delegation included Director, Regional Operations and Consumer Services, Alhaji Jabaru Abukari, Director, Energy Directorate, Mr Fredrick Oblitey, Director, Research and Corporate Affairs, Dr Eric Obutey.
The rest included the Deputy Director, Regional Operations and Consumer Services (In charge of Data Analysis), Mr Leon Acquaye, Head of Corporate Affairs, Dr Robert Aziz and Regional Manager, Western Region, Ms Joyceline Hudson.
FROM CLEMENT ADZEI BOYE, TAKORADI
