Mahama is the only President who solved dumsor – Minority

The Minority in Parliament has praised the effort of former President John Dramani Mahama in solving the power crisis in 2016.

According to the opposition lawmakers, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer is the only President that solves the crisis, popularly known as dumsor.

The Caucus claims that Mahama’s administration left office with an excess capacity of power, leaving the country with about 83 percent of generational capacity.

This statement comes in response to remarks by Energy Minister Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempeh, who attributed the dumsor phenomenon solely to the Mahama government, despite its resurgence during the Akufo-Addo administration.

John Oti Bless, the Ranking Member on the Government Assurances Committee, argued that Mr Mahama is the only Ghanaian president to have effectively solved challenges confronting the power sector.

“Dumsor has been there since time immemorial. All the heads of state or presidents in the history of this country have suffered it. Even during President Kufuor’s era, they had to import generators from outside under Kofi Addah.

“But President John Mahama was bold enough, humble enough, and took responsibility and said he was going to solve it. And he did solve it. Before President Mahama left office, we had excess capacity and our generation was about 83 percent. So let’s get that on record that President Mahama is the only president in the history of this country who solved dumsor.”

The Minister for Energy, Dr. Matthew Opoku Prempreh has accused former President John Mahama as the only leader that superintended over dumsor.

At the Government Assurances Committee meeting in Accra on Friday, May 3, Dr Opoku Prempreh reiterated that the ongoing power crisis is due to efforts to rectify the energy challenges.

“…I told you that when I got to the Ministry we’ve gone past the era where we had 72 to 96 days of lights out and six hours of lights on. We are in the era of ‘dum siesie’ which is profoundly different from dumsor.”

“Dumsor as inflicted on Ghanaians has only happened as characterised his excellency John Dramani Mahama’s governance. He is the only president on record that for four years that he reigned, for four years that he ruled, for four years that he governed, there was ‘dum dum dum.’ If the non-partisan colleague says that now it is worse, then I don’t know where his realities lie,” he stated.

On May 1, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo assured Ghanaians that the power crisis had ended.