Management of Power Distribution Service (PDS) says it will consider installing prepaid meters for residents in the Lower Manya Krobo municipality as a way of curbing frequent agitations between members of the municipality and the power company.
A meeting between the assembly members, PDS and the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) agreed on a roadmap to address the recurring clashes between community members and staff of PDS over non-payment of bills.
Protests turned fatal when residents agitated over a PDS disconnection exercise in the area.
PDS after a data cleaning exercise reviewed the GHc 195 million arrears owed it by the community to GHc 84 million. The parties among other things also agreed on a rescheduling payment plan for customers in the municipality.
In an interview with Citi FM, the Head of Public Relations for PDS, William Boateng said installing prepaid meters will be the best solution moving forward.
“Going forward, we think that the best solution is to get them prepaid meters. We will consider it. But we are talking also about money. The prepaid metering is not free… We will have to access some money before we can go into that particular project.â€
Meanwhile, the United Krobo Association says it is not aware of any resolution made so far and will soon petition the Energy Minister if nothing is done to resolve the issue in the coming days.
Teye Kwao Kaximu, the spokesperson for the association said, “we want to exercise patience to listen to the chiefs for the meantime. If we don’t hear anything from them, we will write a letter to the Energy Ministry to meet Peter Amewu to know how they intend to resolve this problem once and for all.â€
Before the agreement, the residents claimed they were being overbilled following the expiration of a purported agreement between themselves and the Nkrumah government for them to have free power for a period after their relocation from the current location of the Akosmbo Dam.
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