High cost of electricity bills, power outages affecting businesses in the North East Region

01 June 2023 (Ghana Web) Business owners and residential users of electricity in the North East Region are bearing the brunt of the incessant power outages and the high cost of electricity bills in the region which has resulted in the snail-pace progress of their businesses.

The situation is worst in the traditional heart of the Mamprugu Kingdom and the capital of the North East Region, Nalerigu.

The residents in Nalerigu and its environs are facing the incessant power outages in the region more than any district which they say is negatively affecting their lives.

The residents are experiencing fluctuating electricity, hence, not enjoying stable electricity for the past three months or more due to the absence of a primary substation in the region.

The North East Region currently has no NEDCO primary substation or a control point room, however, all the primary substations are in the Upper East Region and Northern regions respectively.

To mitigate the incessant power outages in the area, the government should consider constructing a primary substation in the North East Region to boast the economic activities in the area.

Aside from the worst situation in the regional capital and its environs, the power outages and the high cost of bills are affecting the businesses of residents in the West Mamprusi Municipality, especially, Walewale which is the business hub of the region.

Some of the business owners expressed their dissatisfaction about the electricity tariffs in an interview with GhanaWeb.

Shaibu Mukarima is a make-up artiste and she is losing customers because of power outages and the high cost of electricity bills.

She said "People are not coming just because of the increment. Causal make-up was ghc30 but now we have increased it to ghc40 and some people are not coming because of the price. So, it is really affecting us. We used to buy power ghc50 for a month but now we using it for only two days when we buy ghc50".

At Manza printing press in Walewale, the situation is not different. Abdul Razak Sherif-deen complained that they are not getting all the customers who used to patronise their services due to the tariffs.

"Most of our customers always complain that the prices of our things have increased. Assuming we were printing color printing ghc3, we are now printing it ghc5 because of the increment of the electricity tariffs. We were buying ghc200 every month but now, we are buying ghc400 for a month," he lamented.

Mumuni Seimaw, an apprentice make-up artist said: "One of the challenges we are facing here is because of the light bills, how it cost. Our business needs a fan to keep our customers but the cost of bills is affecting us."