Ghana’s power sector is at a crossroads. While national headlines talk about multibillion-dollar gaps and debt to power producers, the crisis also plays out on the streets of regional capitals like Tamale where unpaid bills, disconnections and violent confrontations between communities and utility staff are making an already fragile system even harder to fix. A national problem with local faces The International Monetary Fund and local reporting warn that Ghana’s energy sector could face a shortfall of roughly $2.2 billion by year-end if reforms and revenue measures aren’t fully implemented. That fiscal strain is the product of delayed tariff adjustments, rising generation costs, accumulated arrears, and persistent revenue shortfalls at state utilities. Beyond the headline numbers, government officials and auditors point at deep collection problems inside the state utilities involving losses, theft and low bill compliance that together eat into the cash the system needs t...
Ghana's energy sector has been in dire crisis over the years with various policies failing to meet the requisite needs of the ailing sector. Until recently, Ghana’s energy sector was plagued by chronic liquidity and payment delays . The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) collected revenue but lacked a transparent system to distribute it across fuel suppliers, IPPs, GRIDCo, VRA and other stakeholders. Resulting issues included: Delayed payments : IPPs waited months for receipt of full payment, severely impacting their ability to maintain operations. Mounting debts : Outstanding invoices ballooned into the billions of dollars, with ECG accumulating arrears to IPPs and fuel suppliers alike. Unpredictable supply : The lack of regular payments triggered power interruptions and unreliable generation. Various governments attempted fixes, but the root cause remained ECG’s weak revenue collection and the absence of a structured fund distribution system. The Energy Sector Recove...