The Chairperson for the Mines and Energy Committee of Parliament, Samuel Atta Akyea is accusing the administration of former president John Mahama, of causing financial loss to the state.

According to him, the take-or-pay Power Purchasing Agreements (PPA) signed by the erstwhile Mahama administration are tantamount to causing financial loss to the state.

“We wish to state that there is no inferred PPA to Asogli. Neither has the Karpower PPA been extended to a regular PPA of 20 to 25 years. Negotiations for these PPAs are still underway.

“There is a huge financial overhang because of take-or-pay. Take-or-pay is an inherited trouble; no dispute about it. It is not the making of President Akufo-Addo, and he [Akufo-Addo] kept the lights on,” Mr Atta Akyea asserted while addressing journalists on Wednesday, June 14.

The chairperson’s comments follow a remark made in an interview by the World Bank Country Director, Pierre Frank Laporte on the country’s debt situation.

The outgoing World Bank official indicated that one of the prominent factors his outfit identified as driving the country’s debt situation was the energy sector.

Mr Laporte blamed both the previous and current administrations for the situation at hand.

He explained that the PPAs were expensive and burdensome because they were signed under a take-or-pay agreements, which committed Ghana to pay for excess energy it did not need.

But his comments prompted a fiery response from the NDC who accused him of engaging in local partisan politics.

But Mr Atta Akyea insists that the PPA contracts that were signed by Mahama’s administration were skewed and oppressive to the Ghanaian.

He pointed out that, “Over the period, a total of about $368 million have been paid for idle capacities and the further $600 million have been paid for the cost of reserve margins, totaling $968 million.

He thereby emphasised that “That’s why I could submit without apology to anybody that this take-or-pay is tantamount to causing financial loss to the state.”