The Minority in Parliament has advised the country director of the World Bank to stay away from local politics and carry out his responsibilities as a technocrat.
Pierre Frank Laporte, World Bank (WB) country director to Ghana, has said the country’s energy sector debt is a major contributor to its debt woes.
Reacting to the claim at a news conference in Parliament on Tuesday (6 June), the Minority spokesperson on Energy and Mines, John Abu Jinapor, challenged Laporte to provide evidence to substantiate his claim.
“President Mahama’s record in the energy sector is unmatched, before leaving office, Mahama ensured that we had a comprehensive foothold on generation, fuel and the financial sector,” he said.
“We will finally wish to advise the World Bank country director to continue to work as a technocrat and not meddle himself in the field of politics.”
Jinapor added: “Laporte, you are not a politician and when you are making unsubstantiated comment, you must bear in mind that it has far reaching ramification on this country.”
Listen to John Abu Jinapor in the attached audio clip below:
Background
In an interview monitored by GNA, the country director indicated that his outfit had identified certain factors that were driving the country’s debt situations.
He said the mismatch between the production cost of the Independent Power Producers (IPPs) vis-à-vis how much consumers paid led to an upsurge of debts since the Government could not make financial commitments to them (IPPs).
Laporte also said the Power Purchasing Agreements (PPAs) the government had signed were expensive. In addition to the exorbitant power purchases the country was paying for energy it does not use due to the ‘’take or pay contracts.’’
‘’ In the case of Ghana, those contracts that have been signed as PPAs are just expensive and the kind of PPAs signed are take or pay. You pay although you do not use it. The fact is that in the past few years, Ghana entered into an agreement at a wrong rate and the wrong price, and it has impacted on the debts situation.’’
He asked the government to pursue some reforms in the areas of tariff adjustments, addressing the transmission losses through improved infrastructure and restructure the power purchasing agreements consistent with the energy demands of the country to reduce significant portion of the debts.
He subsequently advised the Government to take advantage of the West African Power Poll, to provide cheap electricity for its people and industry.
According to the Fitch Ranks, the energy sector is the biggest driver of national debt as the West African Country currently owes independent power producers to the tune of $ 1.58 billion.
Fitch Ranks also says the country had initially reached out to the IPPs to restructure their debts in view of the External and Domestic Debt Restructuring but the companies objected to the proposal.
Reporting by Fred Dzakpata in Accra
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