International firm must probe PDS deal – Kofi Buah

Former Energy Minister, Emmanuel Kofi Armah Buah wants an internationally acclaimed audit firm to probe the Power Distribution Services (PDS) concession debacle to uncover the amount of money the state lost in the entire saga.

According to him, the current situation in which the government finds itself could have been prevented if the several red flags raised about the deal had been heeded to.

Speaking to Citi News, Armah Buah, under whose tenure, the Compact II was signed said the entire energy sector could collapse if the PDS saga is not handled well.

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“The way forward is that there should be an urgent international audit by a reputable company. We want an international reputable firm to come and see where our money has gone. Where is our money? We need to establish that and find a legal means of collecting our money. The consequences of this issue is this; the heart and soul of our energy sector will collapse. We are going to be in crisis, more than we have been before.”

A Finance Ministry letter addressed to the Millennium Challenge Corporation said the government had no choice but to terminate the deal considering all the problems it’s been fraught with.

The agreement for a 20-year concession cleared the way for private-sector participation in Ghana’s power distribution as part of the Millennium Challenge Compact signed on August 4, 2014, between the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) and Ghana’s government.

Following the cancellation of the PDS deal, there have already been calls for sanctions.

The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers (COPEC), for example, has demanded that the government cause the arrest and prosecution of persons who represented Ghana in signing the now canceled concession deal.

Parliament

Amidst the fallout from the cancellation of the power concession agreement with PDS, Member of Parliament for Bongo, Edward Bawa, has questioned the lack of scrutiny of the deal on Parliament’s part.

On Citi TV‘s The Point of View, Mr. Bawa, a member of the Mines and Energy Committee, recalled that legislators spent less than three hours scrutinizing the bulk supply agreement of the deal before it was approved.

The agreement for a 20-year concession was approved on July 24, 2018, paving the way for private-sector participation in Ghana’s power distribution as part of the Millennium Challenge Compact signed on August 4, 2014, between the MCC and the Government of Ghana.