Staff at the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) Monday, embarked on a sit-down strike to protest against their Managing Director.

This follows an initial demand for Mr Kwame Agyeman Budu to be relieved of his role on grounds of incompetence.

According to the staff, the power company is on the verge of collapsing due to the lack of vision and mismanagement by the current MD.

Consequently, the workers initiated moves to demand the dismissal of the MD, which they gave a deadline of 23rd April for authorities to heed to their demand.

However, due to failure to meet their demands, the staff on Monday at 8am, began their strike.

Background

Kwame Agyeman Budu has served as the Managing Director for ECG for about two years.

However, the workers have accused him of breaches in procurement services in the awarding of contracts and outsourcing collection of revenue from SLT customers, to third parties at high commissions [even though that can be done by staff for free] as part of the reasons for their demand.

The Junior and Senior Staff union opined that, the ECG’s technical and commercial losses are rising with conservative estimate of the current system loss figure at over 34% as at February, 2021.

They added that there are no concrete strategies in place to bring them down in the short and medium-term. A figure which was between 23% and 24% as at the time of his assumption of office.

They accused the MD of lacking appreciation of his duties and roles adding that he is “grossly deficient” when it comes to matters relating to administrative and corporate governance while bypassing the structures to give instructions and most of the time threaten artisans, managers without due regard to their supervisors.

The Association argued that the MD is an autocratic leader who does not take their suggestions into consideration.

The union explained that they have, since June 2020, petitioned the Managing Director severally to involve its rank and file in revenue mobilization a request which was turned down.