Ace Ankumah, an Accra based legal practitioner, has rejected the assertion by the ECG managing director that the company cannot be sued. "Yes, it can be sued," he stated when contacted by the Times on the issue Monday. Mr Ankumah said, "the Managing Director's statement admits that customers can sue, but the Managing Director is confident of victory. That contradicts his earlier position that the customers cannot sue". He recalled that even when the ECG was a statutory corporation, the High Court held (in the case of Hasnem v. ECG II 992/2 GLR 250) that N.L.C.D. 125 imposed a duty on the ECG to supply electricity to customers who had such contracts with them, and were therefore required to take such steps as were reasonable to ensure safe supply of electricity. "According to the court, the breach of the duty would give the customer a course of action and might also afford evidence of negligence. ECG was held to owe a duty to their customers to ensure that their cables were capable of serving and actually serving all the places for which it was intended to serve." Mr. Ankumah said even though the plaintiffs ultimately lost the case, it was because they could not prove that the relevant cable was inadequate to service the area in question. "The principle was, therefore, established that if there is evidence of negligence, the ECG would be liable to the judicial process. "Of course, there would be no liability if the cause of the damage to customers’ property was a third party or an Act of God (such as floods and earthquakes) over which the ECG has no control. However, that does not amount to immunity from legal action, and certainly does not constitute a basis for arguing that the ECG was somehow guaranteed legal success in every legal action. "Definitely, if there is proof of negligence, ECG will be held liable. Indeed, if it can be proved that ECG had used inferior material to build or construct its pylons and/or poles when it knew that the area was prone to earthquakes and floods, ECG will have liability", Mr. Ankumah said. Source: Times