Accra, Jan. 3, GNA - The Ghana Water Company (GWCL) on Tuesday said the current acute water shortage in several parts of Accra and Tema was due to frequent power outages at the Kpong water dam.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency on Tuesday, Mr Gerald Samuel Odartey-Lamptey, Managing Director of GWCL said the Kpong station during the Christmas and New Year holidays experienced intermittent power outages making it difficult to supply water to various locations. He said some electrical cables had to be replaced completely by the Electricity Company of Ghana.

The Managing Director noted that demand for water had continued to rise while production had been static.

Mr Odartey-Lamptey said technicians were at present working at the Kpong site to resolve the problem before the close of Tuesday.

GWCL says total population that it serves at Accra West, Accra East and Tema is about 1.284 million, 1.058 million and 645,000 respectively. Demand for Accra West per day is 40.6 million gallons, Accra East 32.1 million gallons and Tema 28.4 million gallons, while supply is 43 million gallons, 17 million gallons and 21 million gallons per day respectively.

This leaves a surplus of 2.4 million gallons per day for Accra West, a deficit of 15.1 million gallons per day for Accra East and deficit of more than seven million gallons per day for Tema. In sum total, GWCL has a deficit of some 20.1 million gallons per day for Accra and Tema.

Mr Odartey-Lamptey said the topography of Accra was changing every now and then with an increase in the population but little had been done to expand the facilities at the supply areas.

He said the GWCL was negotiating with interested foreign partners for the expansion of the Kpong Dam hopefully before the end of 2006.