Former Deputy Power Minister John Jinapor is demanding for government to “publish the load shedding time table to enable Ghanaians to plan their daily schedules” amid the intermittent power supply experienced in the past few weeks.

John Jinapor said the Energy Minister has muzzled power sector state-owned enterprises (SOEs) preventing them from publishing an already prepared schedule.

Frequent power cuts in parts of the country over the last six weeks is stirring fears that Ghana may be returning to the dreaded period of a persistent, irregular, and unpredictable electric power outage - popularly called ‘dumsor’.

Admitting some challenges, Deputy Minister, William Owuraku Aidoo told JoyNews on Tuesday that ongoing repair works on the gas pipeline from Nigeria to Ghana caused the outages adding that supply will return to normalcy by the first week of March 2020.

But John Jinapor is not convinced.

“It is instructive to note that GRIDCo has been clandestinely shedding about 200MW since the first week of February this year with no end in sight.

“Let me be clear, that the dreaded DUMSOR which the Mahama administration resolved is sadly back due to the ineptitude and mismanagement of the energy sector,” he said in a Facebook post.

He further stated, “the Ministry of Energy having been exposed badly with the current ‘dumsor’ the nation is witnessing is moving away from its earlier position that power outages were solely a result of financial challenges.”

He also opined that “government has not procured a single drum of Light Crude Oil (LCO) since 2019.”

Describing government’s justification for the latest spate of outages as a ‘blatant deception’, Mr Jinapor gave a day’s ultimatum to publish a load shedding time table or risk being subjected to other options he says are available to be explored.

“The Minister of Energy is hereby put on notice that failure to comply within 24 hours will compel us to explore all available options under the 1992 Constitution and the Standing Orders of Parliament not excluding a vote of censure on him,” his statement read.

Meanwhile, the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has announced a planned maintenance exercise which will cause power disruptions in many parts of Accra from Tuesday, February 25, 2020.

The exercise, according to the power distributor, is expected to end on Friday, February 28.