Dansoman youth sabotage ECG substation

13/11/2010

Story: Musah Yahaya Jafaru
EFFORTS by the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) to construct a substation at Dansoman to improve power supply has attracted fierce resistance from the youth of the Dansoman Gbebu Electoral Area over the site for the project.
The project is part of the distribution system improvement component of the Ghana Energy Development and Access Project (GEDAP) with a $94.4 million World Bank facility to improve system reliability and the quality of electricity distribution in the country.
But its execution on part of the Karikari Park at Dansoman, which the ECG purchased from the State Housing Company in 2007, has been challenged by the youth of the area who contend that the park serves as a major rallying point for numerous social and political events.
The stand-off has prevailed since April 2010 when the youth of the area rallied and prevented the contractor from entering the site to commence work.
The ECG then sought police assistance for the contractor to begin work on the land but that also failed.
The Director of Engineering of the ECG, Mr Julius Kpekpena, told the Daily Graphic that the World Bank facility would expire in December 2012, by which time the country would have lost the opportunity to access it.
To avoid that, he said, the ECG had engaged the youth of Dansoman on many fronts in a bid to arrive at an amicable settlement.
He said the ECG had proposed, among other things, to use only a small portion of the land and fence the remaining plot for the youth to use as their playground.
Mr Kpekpena said the ECG and the Member of Parliament for the area, Mr Fritz Bafour, had on several occasions tried to resolve the issue with the youth leaders but that had not succeeded.
He said in the heat of the discussion, the youth offered an abandoned cemetery to the ECG as an alternative for the siting of the primary substation.
“Admittedly, a cemetery, from the experience of the company, is not only unsuitable for the nature of the project but will also definitely constitute an affront to the sensibilities of the families whose venerated ancestral heritage will be desecrated in favour of the project. The ECG is not prepared to wade into that controversy and thus politely declined the offer. It is also apparent that an abandoned cemetery will not meet the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) requirement for a primary substation,” he said.
Mr Kpekpena said the ECG had sunk a lot of money into the procurement and preparation of the land for the intended construction of the primary station which was required to deliver a more reliable and stable power supply to Dansoman and its environs.
He said the cost incurred include the purchase of the land, processing and securing an environmental permit from the EPA and a redesign of the substation to make use of a smaller portion of the land.
Besides, Mr Kpekpena said, “the frustration” of the ECG was that any further delay of the project would result in hikes in the project cost and, more seriously, a termination of the project when the World Bank credit expired in 2012.
Ordinarily, the construction of a primary substation takes at least 78 weeks or approximately a year and a half.
Mr Kpekpena said if the current state of affairs continued, Dansoman and the surrounding areas would experience “aggravated incessant periods of low voltages and outages for a very long time”.
He, therefore, appealed to the Accra Metropolitan Chief Executive, Mr Alfred Vanderpuije, and other stakeholders to ensure that the project commenced in good time.
Similar primary substations are being constructed at Kwabenya, Sowutuom, Nmai Djorn, Cantonments and Dahwenya.