The Ashanti West unit of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has appealed to the public to help protect electrical infrastructure, as the utility company grapples with a surge in outages caused by vandalism, vehicle collisions with poles, and unauthorised construction around network equipment.
Public Relations Officer for Ashanti West ECG, Benjamin Ohene Antwi, speaking on Luv FM on Monday, April 20, made the appeal in the context of a broader power supply disruption linked to a planned five-hour overnight shutdown of the Atuabo Gas Processing Plant.
The Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDCo) and the Ghana National Gas Company announced the shutdown, which ran from midnight to 5:00 a.m. on Monday, April 20, to complete the replacement of a damaged Burner Management System (BMS) controller.
Against this backdrop, Mr. Antwi acknowledged that unplanned outages had been occurring with increasing frequency and apologised to the public for the disruptions.
He attributed a significant portion of the outages to physical damage to the network, including bent and broken electric poles, and warned that the actions of some individuals were compounding the problem.
He highlighted that the vandalism of cables serving a transformer around the Oforikrom Police Station substation by unknown individuals triggered outages in Anloga Junction, Bomso, Ayigya, and surrounding communities.
“Some cables for the transformer around the substation at the Oforikrom Police Station had been vandalized, also leading to an outage which we had to fix as well,” he said.
Benjamin confirmed that the matter had been reported to the police and that investigations were ongoing, though no arrests had been made. “We reported the incident to the police and investigations are ongoing. The police are yet to apprehend anyone,” he added.
Mr. Antwi also raised concern about vehicles colliding with ECG poles, describing it as a recurring and troubling pattern. “It looks like whenever someone loses control over their vehicle, the next option is to run into an ECG network. We want our customers to know that that is not fair,” he said.
He further criticised the practice of erecting tall billboards beneath power lines, warning that such structures interfere with the transmission of electricity.
He also cited cases in areas such as Adiembra-Atasamanso and Ohwimase Hilltop, where residents have built concrete structures around utility poles, placing dangerous pressure on them.
“People have built around the poles. We realised that the cement is putting pressure on the poles and the slightest rain broke the poles,” he said. “People have done some concrete works over there to mount billboards. So it was difficult to break ground to identify these cables, it took us almost three days,” he added.
Despite the challenges, Mr. Antwi assured residents that ECG is committed to restoring reliable power across affected communities. “We want to assure our customers that we are working seriously to improve the system,” he noted.
The company urged members of the public to report any suspicious activity around electrical infrastructure to the nearest ECG office or police station.
