ECOWAS Launches Regional Electricity Regulatory Authority

Accra, Nov. 9, GNA - An independent entity to regulate cross-border trade of electricity and provide support to national regulators of the electricity sector in West Africa was launched in Accra on Tuesday.

Known as the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Regional Electricity Regulatory Authority (ERERA), the body was created in 2008, to oversee the development and monitoring of uniform technical rules for the management of the exchanges between interconnected systems to maximize their technical efficiency.

It will also supervise wholesale electricity sales between the various operators in Member States and analysis of their efficiency in order to avoid anti-trust practices and also monitor compliance with commercial rules and contractual commitments by partners, as well as the developing of procedures for the settlement of disputes.

In an address read for him at the launch, Dr Joe Oteng-Adjei, Minister of Energy, said efforts to link electricity networks in the Sub-Region through the West African Power Pool Programme had made remarkable progress with two interconnected sub-systems.

These systems are the sub-system comprising seven member states comprising Burkina Faso-Cote d'Ivoire-Ghana-Togo-Benin-Nigeria-Niger, which are being managed by separate national power companies and the one between Mali, Guinea and Senegal and a non-member state, Mauritania.

Dr Oteng-Adjei reiterated the commitment of Ghana to the Regional Power Integration process in order to reduce the electricity deficit to improve on the lives of the people.

Mr Celestin Talaki, ECOWAS Commissioner in charge of Infrastructure, said the implementation of the regional regulatory body had become necessary to enhance the development of institutional frame that would attract the investors in the sector to reduce the deficit of electricity in many ECOWAS countries.