Akatsi North to be restored onto China Water Electrification Agreement by 2022 – NAPO

• The Energy Minister has said work is in progress to restore communities in the Akatsi North Constituency onto the China Water Electrification Agreement

• The implementation of the electricity project in some five regions will be phased out in line with financial arrangements with the Finance Ministry

• While eight communities have already been issued for the installation watts, the other communities will be added soon

The Minister for Energy, Dr. Matthew Opoku-Prempeh, has stated that works are currently in progress to help communities in the Akatsi North Constituency to be restored back onto the China Water Electrification Agreement.

This comes on the back of questions asked by the Member of Parliament for Akatsi North Peter Nortsu-Kotoe on the steps being adopted by the Energy Ministry to restore communities in his constituency onto the agreement after they got deleted in 2017.

Mr Opoku-Prempeh said, eight of the communities have already been issued for the installation watts, the rest of communities will be considered when all engineering assessment have been met in line with the implementation schedule.

“The implementation of electricity project in Ashanti, Central, Eastern, Volta, and Bono Ahafo Regions will be phased out in line with the financial arrangements with the Ministry of Finance. Phase one which eventually covers a total of 507 communities was completed in 2019; phase two is currently ongoing and is expected to complete at the end of 2022. The Ministry of Energy has requested the contractor, thus China International Water and Electric Corporation to carry out all the behind survey in the communities of the Akatsi North District as evidence. Eight of the communities have already been issued for the installation watts, the rest of the communities will be considered when all engineering assessment has been met in line with the implementation schedule,” he said on the floor of parliament.

Meanwhile, the China Water Electrification Agreement was signed in 2016 to help the country generate enough power to find a solution to the erratic power cuts.

The China International Water and Electric Corp. is a multinational company with businesses in over 40 countries around the world.

The Corporation has completed quite a number of projects in Ghana, most of which are rural electrification projects for more than 2000 communities.