Tamale residents accused of power theft; GH¢8.4m lost every month

Eight out of ten households in the Tamale metropolis of the Northern Region are into electricity theft, according to the Volta River Authority (VRA) and Northern Electricity Department (NEDCo).

This, according to the VRA and NEDCo, accounts for a loss of GH¢8.4 million every month in Tamale metropolis alone.

The NEDCo Senior Staff Association Chairman, William Asare, who revealed this in an interview on 3FM’s Sunrise hosted by Alfred Ocansey, explained that “we lose about 45% of power we generate in Tamale alone through theft”.

“If you visit ten houses in Tamale, you will see eight of these houses stealing power. We lose GH¢8.4 million every month in Tamale alone primarily due to power theft and every attempt by VRA staff to clamp down is met with attacks on the VRA and NEDCo staff.”

No arrest by police

Mr. Asare revealed that several complaints to the police to arrest the perpetrators have not yielded any results.

“And everybody is watching. It appears that stakeholders are waiting for a staff member to be killed in Tamale before they would know that this is serious.

“We have reported this to the police and no one was arrested. We have assurances from REGSEC and all those assurances have not materialized so we had to withdraw our services because that is the surest way to be safe,” he explained.

Mr. Asare said “we want the perpetrators to be arrested and prosecuted because we [VRA and NEDCo] operate in Bono, Ahafo, Bono East, among others and it is only in Tamale that this is going on”.

Military interventions

The Chairman called for military interventions and protections since interventions by the police did not work.

“We want military intervention. We need military protection.”