Energy Minister John Abdulai Jinapor has warned the leadership in the power sector, declaring he would rather sack underperforming chief executives than sacrifice himself over persistent electricity failures.

Appearing on Joy News’ PM Express on Wednesday, April 30, he revealed that he is setting strict Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and timelines for heads of key agencies under his watch, including the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG).

“We’re going to give them timelines,” he said. “We’re going to give them some targets. The Energy Commission has also been invited. That’s a technical regulator.”

He said a full monitoring platform has been set up to track the entire energy value chain, from generation through to distribution.

“I call it the MNGT value chain analysis,” John Jinapor explained.

“We put all the key people on that platform, including how we manage capacity, transmission, distribution, everything.”

John Jinapor was emphatic that he would not hesitate to act if any CEO falls short.

“As Minister, I would ensure that there’s discipline, there’s hard work,” he said.

“If you can’t do that, I recommend your dismissal. Let me be frank, it’s better I dismiss that chief executive who is not working well before I get dismissed. And that one, there’s no compromise on that.”

He underscored the political stakes of power sector failure, referring to how electricity problems contributed to the electoral defeat of the NDC in 2016.

“You know, the ultimate regime killer is the power sector,” he said. “You wouldn’t doubt that part of the reason why you lost elections was because of how long it took you to turn around that power crisis.”

Asked if that painful episode is shaping his current urgency, Jinapor admitted he has learned hard lessons.

“As we grow and as we go through life, we learn. I’ve learned some very, very, very bitter experiences,” he said.

“I’ve been in the sector for quite a while. You’re talking about more than 16 years… So today, when the men come telling me things, I know what is happening.”

He said his long experience gives him a practical edge over technocrats.

“Three days ago, we were going to have load shedding,” Mr Jinapor recalled.

“And I gave some suggestions. For instance, VALCO gets 110 megawatts, but we’re going to have a deficit of about 60 megawatts. I said, 'Look, let’s talk to VALCO so the smelter can work. We can bring them lower to 60 for those three hours. Just after three hours, you bring them back so that you don’t engage in load shedding.”

That intervention, he said, helped avoid planned outages. “When they did that, we went through the system.”

John Jinapor’s message was clear: performance will be tracked, solutions will be enforced, and there will be consequences for failure, starting with leadership.

“There’s no compromise,” he said. “Better I sack him than be sacked myself.”