Residents demonstrate over ECG bills in Somanya

Angry residents of Somanya in the Eastern Region today Monday, November 22, demonstrated to register their displeasure over the electricity bills being churned out by the management of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG).

Scores of the aggrieved customers of ECG clad in red holding placards some of which read “we don’t want you ECG,” “we want VRA,” “Freedom from ECG,” “We will not pay bills,” “ECG move from Krobo lands.”

Others are “Take your prepaid meters away,” “ECG come and take your faulty prepaid meters away from Krobo land,” and “VRA where is our compensation?”

The residents with the protection of personnel from the Ghana Police Service marched through some principal streets in the Manya Krobo district to Kpong junction in the Yilo Krobo area thereby bringing some commercial activities in the area to a halt.

They later presented a petition to the management of Volta River Authority (VRA), urging them to take over the operations of ECG in the area.

According to the demonstrators, their major problem was the issue of over-billing on the part of the management of ECG in the area.

They said the ECG bills are high irrespective of their consumption patterns.

The residents said the introduction of the prepaid meters by ECG in the area has not helped the situation in the area adding that majority of the people in the area are subsistence farmers who cannot afford the bills given by ECG.

“These people here are not salaried workers who can afford the levels of bills churned out by ECG in the area,” they emphasized.

'The demonstrators were also unhappy about being enrolled onto the ECG platforms instead of VRA’s platform when VRA operates on Krobo lands.

“Why should we have VRA operating on Krobo lands for us to be enrolled on ECG platforms for us to be paying huge bills,” they quizzed.

Speaking on Ghana Yensom on Accra100.5FM hosted by Kwame Appiah Kubi, leaders of the United Krobo Foundation, a pressure group and the organizers of the demonstration said since 2014 management of ECG has not been fair to residents due to the situation of accumulated bills in the area.

“ECG could bill residents as much as GHS10,000 at the end of the month, others who are petty traders, seamstresses are billed GHS5000,” they lamented.