A former Head of Communications for the Ministry of Petroleum, Edward Bawa, has rejected accusations that the erstwhile government paid $150 million extra in the AMERI power plant deal.
According to him, the payment was a sound investment decision by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government in a bid to end the recurrent energy crisis during that time.
Speaking to Citi News, Mr. Bawa said, “the government of Ghana didn’t have any dime that was contributed towards the installation, procurement and delivery of power. The government of Ghana was going to just pay off this thing using power that was being purchased through the VRA. The only commitment GOG did was to ensure that a standby measure credit of GH¢51 million was established in the case of default of payment for power procurement and we had to do it.”
He said, “If you read the report that has been stated, they had indicated very clearly that there were reasons why we did this because there was power deficit as a result of poor hydrology, unavailability of thermal plant… Ameri is far better than that of the existing plants that we had.”
A committee constituted by the Energy Minister to review the AMERI deal signed by the former government, revealed in a report that the contract was overpriced by about $150 million.
It noted that, the contractor, PPR, actually built and financed the plant at a cost of $360 million, yet AMERI, which secured the deal, forwarded a bill of $510 million in the agreement.
But the previous administration disagrees that the payment was out of place.
Mr. Bawa said the $150 million was a commission that was included in the original Bills of Quantity submitted to undertake the service, and was paid because AMERI was “not a charity organisation” hence had to be paid for its work.
“If you look at the original contract between the AMERI Group and that of PPR, that was $350 million, meanwhile the BOG in itself it was $510 million, so it meant that there was a difference of $150 million… AMERI was not coming as a charity organisation. It was an investment decision that was made, and that decision brought them to the country,” he said.
In a related development, the immediate past Deputy Energy Minister, John Jinapor, has discredited the report by the committee, describing the committee that produced it as too political.
Mr. Jinapor expressed concern about Mr. Addison’s role on the committee as its chair.
“I am worried about the Chairman of the committee. He is very political. He is a core NPP politician and even before this committee was set up, the NPP made it a campaign promise to find fault with the AMERI deal. You can’t be a complainant and be a judge at the same time,” he said on Eyewitness News on Monday [March 27, 2017].
