PURC seeks law to punish utility providers over poor communication

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Utility service regulator Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) says it intends to seek legal backing to sanction providers, who fail to communicate effectively with consumers and the public as far as interruptions in service provision are concerned.

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The Commission?s Head of Public Relations and External Affairs Nana Yaa Jantuah toldMorning Starr?s Kafui Dey on Starr 103.5FM Monday that the laws governing utility provision currently do not have any stipulations regarding punishing service providers for poor communication.
Ghana?s energy supply chain has a generation system which is regulated by the state-owned Volta River Authority (VRA); a transmission system regulated by the Ghana Grid Company Limited (GRIDco) and a distribution system regulated by the state-owned Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG).
There have been times when the various players trade the buck as far as poor supply or outages are concerned, especially in situations where the public and consumers are taken by surprise.
?They don?t communicate,? Jantuah admitted, adding that: ?It?s not only ECG?VRA should be able to come and tell Ghanaians the kind of generation sources that we have. They should come and let Ghanaians understand extensively that we cannot depend on hydro anymore.?
?We should have a law?You know when the PURC was set up and all these regulatory bodies: Energy Commission, [came into being], the drafters of the law, I don?t think that they thought communication was important?so now we are going to change it?because you see if we give you letters and you don?t the order: we order you and you don?t do it, we should go into the law and penalise you?We can penalise them for the technical side for some administrative side, for the financial side, but when it comes to communications specifically, which is now becoming very key and very important, you can?t pinpoint a law which says that if they do not communicate you can penalise them,? she said.

Jantuah revealed that the law will be amended to make poor communication by the utility providers a punishable offence.
?There is a law: LI 18 (16), which says that if they do not publish a load shedding schedule, you can penalise them, which we did, but the only portion on communication in the law is on publishing a load shedding schedule.
?It does not talk about public education. It does not talk about communicating effectively with the public. It is not there. I?ll be very honest and blunt, so now we are moving to get an amendment?to do an LI that will regulate communication of the utilities.?

Source: StarrFMonline.com

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