The NPP UK and Ireland can reveal on authority that the $ 8.5 million power substation at Buipe commissioned by Vice President John Dramani Mahama on Saturday, 10 December 2011 is not part of the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA) but was part the projects set up in 2007 to serve the Buipe Cement Factory.

Vice President John Dramani was reported to have said during the commissioning that “the provision of electricity to (Buipe) rural communities would form a major component of the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA). He said this when he was inaugurating an 8.5 million-dollar-161/34.5 kV power substation to provide reliable bulk power to the Diamond Cement Company Limited at Buipe in the Northern Region.

The truth is that the Buipe Power Substation was part of the $40 million Buipe Cement Factory initiative which was established in 2007. As readers can recall, the Thursday 6th Dec 2007 edition of the Daily Guide newspaper reported with the head line “$40m Buipe cement factory ready”. In that report it stated that the $40 million project follows painstaking and expensive feasibility studies into the economic viability and availability of high grade limestone in the Buipe area and it includes the setting up of the power substation to serve as its source of energy

The Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo), the company that built the power substation, has on their official website (www.gridcogh.com) also confirmed categorically that the Buipe Substation Project was paid for by two cement factories - the Buipe Cement Company Ltd and Diamond Cement Company Ltd. On the project background, GRIDCo has said on its website that “this project is at the request of two (2) cement manufacturing companies. These companies would pre-finance the cost of implementation and GRIDCo would reimburse part of this capital cost contribution on terms to be later agreed upon”. The Ghana Grid Company has also confirmed that the objective of the project was “to construct a 161/34.5kV to supply permanent bulk power to Buipe Cement Company Ltd and Diamond Savanna Cement Company Ltd. The project also envisages converting the existing power supply system at Buipe from the Shield wire Scheme to the conventional supply scheme to meet the anticipated growth in power demand at Buipe and its environs (including BOST and Volta Lake Transport Company (VLTC)), as a result of locating the cement plants in the area”.

Now, with all these happening far before the assumption of NDC government into power, why should the Vice President John Mahama dishonourably try to link the inauguration of Buipe Power Station to the NDC-SADA? In his attempt to cover up the humiliation engulfing the ruling Mills-NDC government regarding the promises made to the people of Ghana and particularly to the people from the Northern Ghana with the Savannah Accelerated Development Authority (SADA), the Vice President John is further embarrassing himself when he tried to take a false glory from the inauguration of $ 8.5 million power substation. It is a known fact that the construction of Bui Dam to generate over 400 megawatts of power located at Brong Ahafo Region was one of the primary aims of NPP-Kufuor’s government to ensure that a reliable power can be supplied to the Northern part of Ghana so as to entice private manufacturing and production companies to move up north. This idea was in line with the proposal made by Nana Akufo Addo to establish Northern Development Authority, backed by a Northern Development Fund, to help accelerate the economic transformation of the three northern regions.

Hayford Atta Krufi Chairman – NPP UK & Ireland (Research credit: Peter Antwi-Bosiako –member NPPUK Communication group)