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The National Coordinator for the District Road and Improvement Programme (DRIP), Nii Lante Vanderpuye, has accused former Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia of being responsible for the breakdown of the Power Distribution Services (PDS) concession arrangement with the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG).
According to him, “All this PDS thing, I put the blame strictly on the doorstep of Dr Bawumia. If he had not varied the conditionalities underpinning this arrangement, we wouldn’t have arrived at this situation. He used the delegated powers given him to handle the PDS and, on his own discretion, changed the bank guarantee to an insurance guarantee.”
He claimed that Dr Bawumia failed to exercise the necessary oversight on behalf of Ghanaians and the President to ensure that what was initially a good initiative succeeded. “He didn’t consult his team before varying the bank guarantee to an insurance guarantee,” he claimed on Channel One TV on Thursday, November 6.
In 2019, PDS took over the management of ECG’s operations under a 20-year concession deal, which formed part of the Millennium Challenge Compact signed between the Government of Ghana and the U.S. Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC).
The agreement was designed to introduce private-sector efficiency into the power distribution system and enhance electricity service delivery across the country.
However, only a few months after its commencement, the government suspended and eventually cancelled the deal following revelations that the payment guarantees submitted by PDS—allegedly issued by Al Koot Insurance and Reinsurance Company of Qatar—were fraudulent.
Further investigations and subsequent rulings by Qatari courts confirmed that the payment guarantee documents were indeed falsified.
The controversy escalated into a lengthy legal battle in London, where PDS demanded more than US$390 million in compensation, arguing that the contract had been wrongfully terminated.
ECG, however, through its legal representatives led by Cherie Blair KC of Omnia Strategy LLP, defended the termination as lawful on the grounds of fraud.
