Saboteurs behind GRIDCo tower collapse - Energy Minister

Graphic Online Mar - 25 - 2019 , 19:30 3 minutes read

The Minister of Energy, Mr John Peter Amewu has said saboteurs are behind the collapse of a tower belonging to the Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) in Tema on Monday.

In what the Minister describes as an act of vandalism, he said people who were not interested in seeing progress in Ghana and want to plunge the country into darkness are the ones behind the act.

One of GRIDCo's towers collapsed on Monday after thieves vandalised the bolts and nuts at Tema along the Volta Smelter transmission site.

The incident, which happened at about 1:30 am on Monday saw the power generation systems losing some 180 megawatts of power.

The situation saw parts of Dansoman, Kasoa, Swan Lake, and other parts of Accra being plunged into darkness.

The suspected thieves used what is suspected to be a corrosive chemical to weaken the base of the tower and removed the bolts and nuts supporting it before using a hacksaw blade to cut the base of the tower, causing it to collapse on a second tower that is paired with it in a parallel line.

A similar attempt was also made on other transmission towers.

Commenting after visiting the incident site on Monday, the Energy Minister said the act was instigated by persons "who don't care for the destiny of this country, they don't care for your children, so they can go to any length at all, those are the people you have to fear, those are the people that are not to be associated with this our noble society that we are enjoying."

He said the move was an attempt by "faceless" people to plunge the country into total darkness.

Mr Amewu said government believes in the rule of law and good governance and because that is exactly what the country is enjoying, the "saboteurs" don't want to hear about the "dividends" and have therefore initiated "barbaric activities to destroy this country, they will not survive," Mr Amewu stated.

Asked if he suspected any particular political interest, Mr Amewu said he was aware "other pylons have also been targetted and security patrols have been intensified" on them.

The Energy Minister said all strategic national assets should be a concern for every citizen, "we must be our own security, because the way these things are progressing, all our strategic installations, we need to be extremely careful and protect them, every single person of this country has to take national strategic assets as their own assets and that is the way we need to do things now."

"I can assure you that although the security is on top of the situation, national security has been informed, we as citizens ourselves must begin to take our destiny in our hands," the Minister said.