The Central Regional Office of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) spent GH¢94,671.24 to replace electric poles burnt through bush fires in 2016, the office has stated.
According to the Regional Maintenance Engineer of the company, Mr William Coleman, the figure did not include the cost of labour and transport to carry out the exercise.
Mr Coleman made this known in an interview with the Daily Graphic last Monday and said the situation negatively impacted on the finances of the company.
Burnt poles
He stated that the company lost 78 high tension and 49 low tension poles across the 10 operational districts in the region, particularly in the Saltpond, Cape Coast, Assin Fosu and the Kasoa North districts.
Mr Coleman said the incessant setting of “unguarded fires” led to the burning of the poles.
He added that hundreds of the company’s customers had to be taken off the national grid to allow for the replacement of the burnt poles.
The maintenance engineer stated that the burning of electricity poles was dangerous to human lives since in most cases the burnt poles fell with live ECG conductors.
Setting of fires
He said the activities of farmers and other people who set fires close to ECG poles had resulted in the loss of revenue which could have been directed to improving the value and reliability of the distribution network.
The Central Regional Public Relations Officer of ECG, Mr Isaac Nurris Ainooson, said the company would not look on while its resource went waste, adding that the company would clamp down on perpetrators of such activities.
He intimated that anybody found to have set fire which eventually destroyed an ECG pole would be made to pay for the cost of the replacement.
Mr Ainooson said the company would also intensify education on the menace in an effort to curb it and urged the media and other stakeholders to support the company to bring an end to this problem.
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