The Controller

Ghana’s electricity is supplied mainly, and I daresay solely by the Akosombo Dam which, when all things are well and good is managed by the able Electricity Company of Ghana but when all things are bad, the blame game between the ECG, Volta River Authority and GRIDCo comes to play.

 

In my short existence, I have witnessed some power cuts and load shedding. Load shedding is seriously not as painful as unannounced power cuts and interruptions in power supply. Power cuts in-between load shedding is arguably the most painful of all. 

Ghana is again faced with some electricity and power supply issues with regards to demand. It was announced that load shedding, unfortunately will begin again. Love it or hate it, politicize this or not, we are in the dilemma. The time table with regards to the load shedding has been issued but is ECG or whoever is in charge of the shedding following it?

On three occasions since this load shedding began, Pig Farm, where I live has faced power cuts for close to twelve hours. Who do we ask when this occurs? It is unfortunate that we hail the power givers whenever they give us power which they are supposed to give us anyway. We have long praised mediocrity that complaining about a bad thing will be pitiful to one’s own self. For me and my Pig Farm folks, the general consensus is that they do not care about us. We have been forced to accept the unacceptable. Our power goes off anytime, even when they took it off two nights ago and will surely take it again tomorrow night when it will be our legitimate turn for our power to be cut.

Indeed, he who controls power controls a lot of things, including experimenting with a whole neighborhood as if it were a disco!