Former Energy Minister Boakye Agyarko says members of the opposition NDC have no basis to complain over the $170 million judgment debt that has arisen out of the cancellation of the Ghana Power Generation Company (GPGC).
Mr. Agyarko who was in charge of the Energy Ministry at the time the contract was terminated says the nation would have wasted more money over time if the contract was not terminated.
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“We have paid almost over $1 billion for excess capacity. The review committee estimated that the contract as they were if they were allowed to stand, the country will be paying at the end of the 13th year $7.2 billion in excess capacity charges. Now if the country is going to be saddled with $7.2 billion for excess capacity, we needed to rethink. In the PPA review, what it said was that if we could get the termination and the management of all the excess capacity, the liability that we will be faced with is about $600 million out of pocket.”
“Now $600 million in year one compared to $7.2 billion, now even if you do the next present value calculation and bring the $7.2 billion into a one-year payment, we are still better off. I don’t understand why the people whose time these excess capacity contracts were signed now have the guts and the audacity to accuse people who are trying to manage the mess they created,” he told Accra-based Citi FM.
Meanwhile, the Executive Director for the Institute of Energy Security, Nana Amoasi VII, has taken a swipe at the Attorney General, Godfred Dame, describing him as negligent for his failure to defend Ghana on the $170 million judgment debt.
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In an interview on the Morning Starr on Thursday, Nana Amoasi VII called on the Attorney General to account to Ghanaians why he failed to appeal the $170 million judgment debt in time.
“We had an opportunity to go and appeal against the decision and we chose to use Covid-19 and election as excuses. The Attorney General was negligent as well. He didn’t act well. He could have defended us better so we should look into it.”
