The Upper East regional office of the PURC, in its effort to provide effective regulatory services to stakeholders, has initiated a programmme dubbed “Accounting to The People”. This is a platform where the PURC and Utility Service Providers closely interact with residents and leaders in various communities to discuss issues on safe, reliable, and quality service delivery.
The regional office, through its routine monitoring of consumer interactions on radio programmes and text messages received via official SMS and WhatsApp platforms across the Upper East and North East regions, observed that a number of concerns were raised by community leaders and the general public with respect to the quality-of-service delivery in the region. The Commission fully appreciates the concerns of all stakeholders and recognizes that, sharing of information and ideas through effective collaborative efforts is essential to addressing some of these challenges. Thus, the “Accounting to the People” programme was initiated by the regional office together with the service provider (NEDCo) to engage consumers in the affected communities and address their concerns.
During the deliberations, the chiefs and people of Builsa North (Sandema) and Builsa South (Fumbisi) indicated that, in recent times, power supply to their communities has been unstable and of poor quality. Several calls were made on the service provider to address their concerns for the delivery of reliable and quality services without any positive response from the service provider. However, NEDCo indicated that there were a number of challenges that led to the poor service delivery which have been identified and are being addressed.
Mr. Seth Kponyo, the Upper East Regional Manager of PURC, apologized for the intermittent power supply to consumers in the area and appealed for calm among the consuming public during the engagement. Mr. Kponyo explained that, the Commission upon receipt of a complaint from a consumer, forwards it to the utility service providers and follows up to ensure that the complaint is resolved. These were the initial actions taken by the Commission on their issues. However, as a result of persistent complaints, the Commission decided to engage consumers in their various communities, thereby bringing the services of the Commission closer to the people and to ensure accountability to its stakeholders. Mr. Kponyo also appealed to consumers to first make their complaints to the service provider and subsequently report to the Regulator if their concerns are not adequately addressed. He added that as part of its mandate, the PURC will continue to monitor and enforce standards of performance for the provision of quality utility services
Ing. Ishmael Kwofi, the Area Engineer for NEDCo, explained that the extensive distance of the distribution network from Navorongo, Sandema through Fumbisi to Yagaba sometimes results in unplanned outages. Ing. Kwofi also indicated that, the activities of bats, coupled with vegetation growth and the storms of the season contribute to the intermittent and prolonged outages in the area.
According to Ing. Kwofi, while the establishment of a substation at a convenient place was considered a long-term measure, pruning of trees and vegetation cover, placement of auto reclosers, and installation of more insulators on the feeder are short term measures put in place to deal with the rampant loss of power supply to the area. NEDCo indicated that work was underway and assured that significant improvement would be realized within 14 days from the day of the meeting.
The consumers asked questions and raised concerns which were satisfactorily addressed by the PURC and NEDCo. The chiefs and the people of Sandema and Fumbisi expressed their gratitude to the PURC for responding promptly to consumer concerns and for creating a platform for the dialogue.
Mr. Kponyo assured the stakeholders that, the PURC will closely monitor the implementation process proposed by NEDCo to end the frequent power fluctuation within the stipulated duration.
The PURC Team comprised Mr. Kponyo Seth, Regional Manager; Mr. Mohammed Adams Suleman, Public Relations Officer; and Abdulai Ikililu, Complaint Resolution Officer. The team from NEDCo comprised Ing. Ishmael Kwofi, Area Engineer; Mr. Yaya Fatau, I.T officer; and Mrs. Adisah Adoctar, HR Manager.
