Spokesperson of Energy Ministry resigns after firing of Boakye Agyarko

The head of communications for the Energy Ministry, Nana Damoah, has resigned just moments after he hinted of exposing all other government officials who contributed to the controversial Ameri power renegotiation deal.

In a deleted Facebook post, Nana Damoah alleged that the sacked energy minister, Boakye Agyarko, was not entirely to blame for controversies surrounding the controversial Ameri deal as there are other people involved.

"It’s time for the emails. Let’s play. He is to blame abi? He did it alone right? Ok?” the Facebook post indicated."

Meanwhile, Nana Damoah has pulled down this post and rather replaced it with what seems like a resignation from office as the PRO of the energy ministry.

"It is only right now that I step down. May the good lord see the rest through. Thank you all," the Facebook post revealed.

Boakye Agyarko's reaction:

The sacked energy minister, Boakye Agyarko, has hinted of reacting to his firing by the president in the coming days. Barely hours after the decision by the president to sack him, Boakye Agyarko says he would soon respond in due time.

In just 11 words on his Facebook wall, the embattled energy minister argued that "when the dust settles" he will respond to all allegations and circumstances leading to his sacking.



Background:

The $510 million Ameri power deal was signed between the Mahama led government in 2015 at a time when the country was experiencing the power crisis. This power deal was to help bring Ghana out of the energy crisis which had cost the country millions of cedis.

However, the deal triggered a well of controversy with civil society groups including IMANI, ACEP raising issues about the cost of the power plant.

Before the Akufo-Addo administration, the NPP vowed to review the agreement if it won power and shortly after it did, the Akufo-Addo led government quickly set up a 17-member committee led by Philip Addison, a lawyer, to investigate the details of the agreement.

Based on this new agreement, the government believed a new deal will save the country a whopping amount of $400 million over a 15-year period.

Under this agreement, a new company- Mytilineous International Trading Company will take over the management of the Ameri power plants for 15 years.

The new company has offered to pay Ameri an amount of $52,160,560.00, with the government paying the remaining $39 million to the Dubai-based company so they can wash their hands off the deal entirely.



According to Boakye Agyarko, this new agreement will see the price at which government buys power to be reduced from 14.5919 cents to 11.7125 cents per kWh which will lead to a savings of $405.067 million.

“The drop in the tariff of US cents 2.8793 per kWh has resulted in a yearly cost savings of about $27.004 million. The total cost of savings over the 15 year period is $405.067m,” excerpts of the new agreement stated. This new agreement by Boakye Agyarko was fiercely rejected by the opposition NDC which argued that the deal will make Ghana pay double the amount for the original contract to AMERI.

Based on all these controversies, the government set up a committee to examine the new agreement only to realize the entire power agreement was a poor job done.