It is almost certain that consumers of electricity and water will be paying more for the utilities. Utility service providers seem to be making a strong case for the upward adjustment, Joy News has gathered, however how much more consumers are likely to pay is not certain. At a stakeholders meeting yesterday, the Volta River Authority, the Electricity Company of Ghana and the Ghana Grid Company made the point there is the need for consumers to pay what they called realistic tariffs to guarantee quality service. Chairman of the Technical Committee of PURC, Moses Asaga is however not convinced. According to him, the utility companies have failed to justify the need for tariff increase with the quality of the service they provide. But speaking to Joy News’ parliamentary correspondent Elton John Brobbey, a member of Parliament’s Select Committee on Mines and Energy, Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak said the committee was happy with VRA’s proposal. He confirmed that the VRA’s proposal “sound convincing”, and for him everything “was clear” that the company was being staffed with finance as they can hardly recoup the cost of powering their plants with fuel. “If something is not done they will be operating at a lost,” he said. For the Electricity Company of Ghana Alhaji Muntaka stated, “I was not convinced about their presentation at all”. According to him, the failure of the ECG to collect revenues owed them by consumers should be their own “headache”. He charged them to package their service well and run the company as a business. He said if that is done and they render good service to their consumers it would not be difficult asking them to pay more. Nevertheless, he noted that since the case of VRA is “justifiable”, they will be allowed to sell at a higher price. Though the level to be added is unknown, Alhaji Muntaka said “by the end of June we should be coming out with something concrete.” Meanwhile, Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation (BOST) Company Limited today met members of the Parliament’s Select Committee on Mines and Energy asking for more pay for their service.