Cause for Concern: Recent Experience of Load Shedding in Ghana Leading up to the 2014 World Cup

The government of Ghana and Ghanaians had real cause for concern regarding the prospect of having reliable electricity during the Black Stars' matches scheduled for 16 June and 26 June 2014. Even though approximately 70% of Ghana's population had access to the grid, Ghana's electricity generation capacity (2,800 MW) was not able to meet demand. The country was in the depths of an energy crisis, and so load shedding occurred frequently in the summer of 2014.

Blackouts were not new in Ghana, however. Since Ghana relied heavily on large hydro-electric dams for over 52% of its electricity, the country had experienced several earlier energy crises when drought led to unusually low water levels (Volta River Authority 2015).Footnote ⁷ Recurrent low water levels induced by climate change meant that the dams' turbines could not function at full capacity (Gt_060314_2). In addition, a rupture caused by pirates in the West African Gas Pipeline (WAGP) from Nigeria in 2012 disrupted fuel supplies for the country's thermal plants. Generation capacity was further diminished when the Aboadze Power Plant was shut down in early 2014. Line losses due to inefficient transmission and distribution infrastructure exceeded 25%, with some interviewees estimating losses approaching 40% (LB-LM-1-052714; LB-22-060614; LB-13-060314). The distribution and transmission lines also needed maintenance and would periodically be taken off-line while being repaired.Footnote ⁸ Yet, the distribution companies in charge of maintaining electricity lines were chronically under-funded, in part because the Ghanaian government – which consumes 14% of the country's electricity for power in public schools, universities, agencies, etc. – stopped paying its own electricity bills to the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) in 2012 (LB-22-060614). By the spring of 2014, the ECG threatened to cut power to public institutions that had accumulated massive utility bill debts. All of these challenges had reinforced each other between 2012 and 2014 while the Ghanaian government reported that demand for power was growing by 7–8% per year (Gt_052214_1). Meanwhile, the Ghanaian government continued to mandate a low-cost tariff, which allowed domestic consumers to purchase electricity at cheaper rates than industries and below production costs, thus requiring the country's distribution companies to operate at a loss (LB-13-060314).

Earlier in 2014, the Ghanaian government moved to raise electricity tariffs with the long-term goal of attracting new independent power producers. The government's goal was to rapidly increase the generation capacity from 2,800 MW in 2014 to 5,000 MW by 2016, and achieve universal access by 2020. The immediate challenge, however, continued to be the lack of reliable electricity, not access. In March 2014, the ECG announced a monthly emergency load-shedding schedule, but May's schedule was not made public until the very end of that month (Gt_052714_1), and the previous timetable had not been followed (Dg_052714_1).Footnote ⁹ On 28 May, the Public Utility Regulatory Commission (PURC) announced that it was going to sanction the utility providers (ECG, VRA and GRIDCo) for their inability to give information to consumers about the expected availability of the power supply (Dg_052814_1).

The typical complaints about the energy crisis (Gt_052814_1) began to heighten and become more intense as the World Cup games drew near. An editorial in the Daily Graphic (Dg_052714_2) warned: ‘In about two weeks, the biggest global soccer fiesta will kick off in Brazil, and Ghana is a big stakeholder in the 2014 Mundial. Ghanaians will need power to be part of this historic event for, after all, sports, especially competitive soccer is the unifier of the political divide.’ While conducting fieldwork in late May and early June, non-Ghanaian interview respondents often joked about this as a looming problem for the government while Ghanaian respondents more frequently acknowledged the gravity of the issue for the people. Street vendors sold Ghanaian flags and football jerseys on many corners, and many taxi drivers adorned their windshields with small Ghanaian flags. Upon finding out that we were American, every Ghanaian we encountered happily predicted their national team's upcoming victory against the USA.

Great Lengths by the GOG to Keep the Televisions On

The Ghanaian government went to great lengths to provide reliable electricity during both of the World Cup matches on 16 and 26 June 2014. These efforts were in four different areas. First, despite existing constraints, the VRA and other utility providers were told to run the power plants at absolute maximum capacity.

Second, the government imported 50 MW of power from neighbouring Côte d'Ivoire. Ghana has on several other occasions of high salience for domestic consumers purchased power from Côte d'Ivoire, for example, to enable the broadcast of the Black Stars' semi-final match during the African Cup of Nations Tournament on 5 February 2015, and to facilitate the enjoyment of the Easter holiday in April 2015. Nevertheless, these notable exceptions highlight that this was a reversal of Ghana's historic role as a regional hub and exporter of power. The recognition of this regional importance was demonstrated by the laudatory comments of a member of the political elite from Benin, a country that imports from Ghana, after a recent tour to Akosombo Dam. The President of Benin's National Assembly commended the VRA and said, ‘The whole of the West Africa sub-region is proud of Ghana's immense contribution towards the socioeconomic development of the region. And I am proud to see for myself the source of the electric power which has been the backbone of the country’ (Volta River Authority 2014b: 22).

Third, the Ghanaian government ordered VALCO, one of the largest buyers of VRA's power, to slow production. While the contemporary newspaper coverage highlights that this government pressure on a pivotal industrial company was a reversal in Ghana's formal policy, a deeper historical analysis reveals that the Ghanaian government had repeatedly asked VALCO to cut production during previous electricity shortages (i.e. 1982–1984, 1998–2000, 2006–2007). VALCO had an historic agreement to purchase a minimum of 300 MW of the Akosombo dam's power (about 30% of its total capacity) for a period of 30 years in order to stabilise investment returns for the VRA.Footnote ¹⁰ VALCO was thus not simply any big company, but was one of the first investors in the Akosombo dam, and more abstractly, one of the cornerstones of the Ghanaian national economy (Volta River Authority 2013). Whenever Nkrumah discussed electrification in Ghana, he always cited the importance of this first aluminium smelter (VALCO), not only as the major customer for the dam but also as a critical new industry for Ghana, providing industrial materials and significant employment (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 42).

Fourth, the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum (MOEP) launched a national energy conservation campaign, ‘Switch off your deep freezer’, to encourage consumers to conserve electricity during peak watching times between 6 pm and midnight. Newspapers reported on the day of the first World Cup match that, according to the Deputy Minister John Jinapor, if the owners of the 1·2 million deep freezers and the 2 million refrigerators obeyed and switched them off during that peak period, over 400 MW of energy would be conserved, equal to the generation from the two Kpong power plants (Gt_061614_1). The same ministry official enlisted the help of telecommunication companies to send text messages to subscribers to remind them to switch off their freezers and appliances at night. In one interview, the CEO of the Volta River Authority appealed to the public to help conserve electricity, particularly during the 2014 World Cup tournament (Gt_061314_1).

All four of these government actions show that the government of Ghana was deeply committed to ensuring the public provision of electricity during the World Cup. What is also evident is that these bold responses were stop-gap solutions. Indeed, the government of Ghana has continued to struggle to provide enough electricity, and load shedding continues. What can these aggressive actions at this particular moment of the World Cup tell us about the provision of electricity as a public good in Ghana?

Nkrumah Marshalls the Newly Independent Ghanaian State to Expand Electricity Access for Domestic Industry and Ghanaian Citizens in the early 1960s

When Kwame Nkrumah came to power as Ghana's first independence leader, he defined the problem more broadly than contemporary government elites: the challenge was to achieve accelerated ‘national development’ for the country as a whole (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960h: 248). He justified the expense and effort of the Volta River project by arguing that Ghana's development crucially depended on access to electricity:

In other speeches to parliament, to citizens, or to the press, he repeatedly highlighted the primary importance of increasing access to power for the economic development of Ghana. For Nkrumah, the meaning of development was both a broad process of industrialisation as well as the improvement of living standards for the Ghanaian people (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960e). He explicitly linked addressing the economic and social needs of the people to citizenship, saying that the Ghanaian Government was ‘raising the standard of life and providing amenities which give to all citizens the essential things of life’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960g: 156).

Articulating a bold ideological commitment to African socialism throughout his speeches, Nkrumah clearly identified the Ghanaian state as the key player in providing the electricity infrastructure through public resources (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a). From the early planning, the Ghanaian government emphasised the need for an industrial partner that would serve as a major customer of the Akosombo dam and thus reduce the initial cost of power by sharing the bill. He acknowledged somewhat defensively that the massive scale of the Akosombo dam required significant financial support from foreign investors, notably the Americans, and even the British. This commitment thus pushed Nkrumah to allow Ghana to become heavily indebted to its former colonial master as well as the new hegemons of the post-WWII era, the USA and the World Bank. Birmingham (Reference Birmingham1998: 66, 91) argues that Nkrumah's determination to build Akosombo coupled with his ‘naïve’ approach to the negotiation resulted in unfavourable terms that made Ghana a ‘prisoner of the West’. Nkrumah, of course, resisted this idea at the time by emphasising how Ghana was a free and sovereign nation. Indeed, Nkrumah pointed to development projects, such as Akosombo Dam, as an indicator that life had changed in Ghana only three years after independence (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960d). Moreover, he insisted that while Ghana would accept financial assistance from ‘all quarters’, including both the USA and USSR, there must be ‘no strings to such aid’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960g: 157; see also Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1963a). Boateng's analysis (Reference Boateng2003: 133) of the Akosombo negotiations also reveal Nkrumah's vulnerability at the time.

For Nkrumah, his top priority was to build the electricity infrastructure of the country. He had advocated the Volta River Project since the early 1950s, promising in a CPP election manifesto in 1951 that, if elected they would ‘do everything possible to harness power from the Volta’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 37i).Footnote ¹¹ Once in power, Nkrumah described it as ‘foremost among the many schemes which we have for increasing our industrial productivity’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1960f: 101). Nkrumah raised the proposal to US President Eisenhower in 1957 (the year of Ghana's independence) and was anxious to push negotiations forward with the World Bank, USA and UK, and proceed as quickly as possible to construction. During a tour of Akosombo Dam during the fieldwork in May 2014, the VRA guide pointed up to the President's villa, which had been built by Nkrumah with the express purpose of surveying the pace of the construction work. In his ‘Christmas Message’ to Ghanaians at the end of 1960, Nkrumah was proud to announce that the ‘mighty Volta River Project is under way’ and that planning had begun for a second hydro-electric dam at Bui (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah1960i: 255).Footnote ¹² Nkrumah seemed conscious of the pressure but also the opportunity to leapfrog the energy ladder (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1963b), skipping over the earlier stages of coal, oil and gas within just a generation. He proudly explained how:

Although not employing the terminology of sustainability or renewable resources, Nkrumah on a couple of occasions pointed out the limitations of fossil fuel sources, which had to be imported, and the ‘intriguing possibilities’ of ‘the harnessing of energy from the sun’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961c: 169–70).

Unlike the more diffuse, and at times, shifting rationale of contemporary government elites, Nkrumah appears singularly focused on providing electricity to promote industrialisation and the social and economic development of the Ghanaian people. In a significant speech where he updated parliament on the Volta River Project, Nkrumah (Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 36–7) described how other more industrialised countries emerged from the development of a large and reliable source of power: ‘New nations, such as ours, which are determined by every possible means to catch up in industrial strength, must have electricity in abundance before they can expect any large-scale industrial advance. Electricity is the basis for industrialisation. That basically is the justification for the Volta River Project.’ In contrast to the contemporary government elites' emphasis on providing electricity to attract foreign businesses, Nkrumah consistently linked the provision of electricity to domestic industries, ‘our factories’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961d: 185).

In almost every speech, Nkrumah cited industrialisation first but then almost always extolled the benefits of a ‘national electricity grid system’ for Ghanaian citizens (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 39). In an update to the National Assembly about the progress on Akosombo in 1963, he described the numerous benefits of the project for citizens, particularly in rural areas: ‘The abundant supply of electrical power will bring light to thousands of homes in the countryside where darkness now prevails’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1963a: 22). Before the dam was even operating and the initial transmission lines were completed, Nkrumah was already pushing for future extensions of the national grid. The idea of public electricity provision was that it would be universal, available ‘throughout the towns and villages of Ghana’ and in ‘the smallest nook and corner of Ghana’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1962a: 32, Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1962b: 152). From the beginning, Nkrumah envisioned Akosombo as a source of great national pride as ‘one of the major engineering feats of the world’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 44). Concurrent with the development of the dam and power station was the construction of a first-class hotel for tourists so that they could ‘see this gigantic dream come true … and imbibe the message of hope and growth it conveys for our Nation’ (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1963a: 23). Schoolchildren from all over Ghana as well as international visitors continue to tour Akosombo today.

For Nkrumah, a secondary, but nevertheless important, motivation for providing electricity infrastructure was to export power to neighbouring countries in the region. The development of these regional economic ties aligned well with his near-constant appeals for pan-African unity and mutual support (Nkrumah Reference Nkrumah and Obeng1961a: 40). The enduring significance of Nkrumah's legacy as a leader of development in the region is revealed by a comment from the President of Guinea when he visited Akosombo Dam in 2014. President Alpha Conde exclaimed, ‘The Akosombo Plant was such a significant and gigantic achievement that President Nkrumah was, indeed, a visionary as well as a great builder, deserving of being ranked among the world's greatest presidents' (Volta River Authority 2014a: 6).

In summary, Nkrumah conceptualised the problem at independence as one of electricity access. He strongly believed that the government of Ghana had an obligation to provide electricity infrastructure as the preeminent priority for both the development of the new nation's industry and its citizens. Below, we see how this conceptualisation has evolved and changed in important ways under Rawlings and for contemporary government elites and is currently contested by Ghanaian citizens.

Rawlings Expands Access but through Neoliberal Self-Help

Ironically, just one month after he inaugurated the Akosombo Dam on 22 January 1966, Nkrumah was overthrown by a military coup while out of the country for a state visit to North Vietnam and China (Boateng Reference Boateng2003). Over the next decade, Ghana was consumed by political instability, alternating between military regimes and brief periods of democratic rule (Ziorklui Reference Ziorklui1988). Investment in public infrastructure, including for electricity provision, was crippled by ballooning external debt and the lack of foreign exchange (Gyimah-Boadi Reference Gyimah-Boadi and Gyimah-Boadi1993: 2–3). After J.J. Rawlings came to power, expanding electricity access again became a central political objective, but the ideological paradigm had shifted away from Nkrumah's African socialism. Rawlings' initial grassroots, revolutionary rhetoric of ‘Power to the People’ evolved into a populist brand of neoliberalism by the mid-1980s (Hansen Reference Hansen1991: 130–2).

Like Nkrumah, Rawlings continued to focus on expanding access to electricity by extending the ‘national grid’ (Rawlings Reference Rawlings2000). Between the period of the late 1980s and the mid-1990s, the Ghanaian government had provided electricity to four additional regions: Brong-Ahafo, Northern, Upper East and Upper West. In a 1990 speech inaugurating the national grid extending to the northern border of the country in Bolgatanga, Rawlings described how the ‘vitalising spark of electricity’ serves to reduce isolation and strengthen national integration (Rawlings Reference Rawlings1990: 49). A decade later, in a speech to parliament in January 2000, Rawlings reiterated his goal to ‘extend electricity to all parts of Ghana’ (Rawlings Reference Rawlings2000). By the time Rawlings left office in 2001, all district capitals plus 2022 towns and villages had been connected to the grid at a cost of $291 million (Danso-Boafo Reference Danso-Boafo2014).

Despite the similarity in the overarching objective, Rawlings' approach to electricity provision and his view of who was responsible differed remarkably from Nkrumah. Where Nkrumah emphasised the state's role in providing electricity for its citizens, Rawlings urged communities to make contributions and help themselves. In addition to the National Electrification Plan (NEP), Rawlings organised the Self-Help Electrification Project (SHEP) to accomplish his goals of expanding electricity access. In 1986, at a commemoration of the commissioning of the first phase of an electrification project in Mafi-Kumase, Rawlings congratulated the community for helping to finance the project and admonished others to follow this example:

Rawlings continued in this speech to emphasise the duties that Ghanaians had to pay their taxes. But, during this authoritarian period of PNDC rule, this obligation was not framed as a reciprocal expectation of citizenship, but, rather, as a condition of future economic development. Electricity was explicitly described as a wise investment because it was productive and could be used to ‘generate funds for further development’, and not simply providing comforts and amenities (Rawlings Reference Rawlings1986: 43). Rawlings exhorted the newly connected residents of the Upper East region that it was not enough to light up their homes, hotels and nightclubs; electrical power should be ‘properly channelled’ in light industry, processing and production (Rawlings Reference Rawlings1990: 50).

Throughout his tenure, Rawlings consistently emphasised that decentralisation and the ‘involvement of local people’ was critical for the sustainability of any infrastructure project (Rawlings Reference Rawlings1993: 39). In all sectors, not just electricity, efficient service delivery was predicated on the idea of users contributing or paying for part of the cost of what they consumed (Ninsin Reference Ninsin and Gyimah-Boadi1993: 96). Rawlings highlighted that the ‘public sector alone cannot be expected to deliver these [economic infrastructure needs] to meet our expectations’ (Rawlings Reference Rawlings1995: 122). Rawlings showcased the importance of a variety of international donors and foreign investors in financing the expansion of electricity provision, and began to increasingly emphasise and encourage the role of the private sector. Overall, Rawlings enabled the persistence of Nkrumah's legacy in terms of citizens' expectations of electricity as a right but the role of the Ghanaian state in facilitating that provision had changed considerably during this era of neoliberal globalisation.

Contemporary Government Elites Court Foreign Investors to Expand Access and Reliability of Electricity but Blame Consumers

In contrast to the blunt and concrete focus on increasing electricity access by both Nkrumah and Rawlings, contemporary government elites understood the problem in more diffuse and abstract terms as a ‘lack of energy security’. Government officials described the problem in more technocratic language, highlighting the quantitative shortfall (i.e. an ‘energy supply deficit’ (Dgui_062314_1), rather than the qualitative experience of the energy problem to Ghanaians. While the historic concern with universal access was still expressed on occasion, government elites articulated the core problem to Ghanaians as one of technical ‘generation challenges’ that has led to a lack of reliability (ECG 2014).

Notably, government officials discussed the energy problems in Ghana using passive language. Accordingly, the government of Ghana was not responsible. Instead, government officials from the executive, bureaucracy and legislature pointed to broader, structural issues such as low water levels, cost of light crude oil and the disruption in the WAGP (Dg_051214_3; Gt_060314_2; Gt_061314_1). For example, President Mahama blamed both the WAGP and the high cost of importing crude oil for thermal plants as the primary causes of the energy problem (Gt_052914_1). The weather, international commodity prices and pirates in international waters were obviously beyond the control of any one government like Ghana.Footnote ¹³

What was possible, according to contemporary government officials, was to increase Ghana's generation capacity to 5,000 MW by 2020. While Nkrumah also shared the same goal, the contemporary government strategy was much more focused on courting foreign, private sector companies and creating favourable conditions for private sector investment. As Vice President Kwesi Bekoe Amissah Arthur explained: ‘Power remains critical in the country's quest to accelerate its economic and social progress, and for which government will lend its weight to prudent initiatives by the private sector to add more kilowatts to address the country's ever increasing energy demand’ (Gt_071814_1).

The Vice President then proceeded to highlight the ‘congenial business atmosphere and effective legal frame’ that should encourage companies to invest in Ghana. In another example, the Acting Head of Mission of the Ghana Embassy in China described a meeting with Chinese power producers in Beijing where the Ghanaian government was encouraging Chinese investment: ‘To fill the 3,000 MW demand, government is ready for partnership with the private sector. The government is actively promoting independent power production in the country’ (Dg_051214_2). He then highlighted the numerous government policies making investment in Ghana attractive, including competitive tax rates, import duty exemptions, government rebates for locating in regional capitals, and investment protection agreements that allow 100% FDI.

In the summer of 2014, Ghanaian government officials seemed rather desperate in their search for new technocratic solutions to the problem. Ghanaian officials were clearly considering any option that might increase their generation capacity using cheaper fuels, including coal (Gt_052914_1; Gt_052214_1; Gt_061314_1), nuclear power (Gt_071714_1; Dgui_072114_1), tidal wave technology (Gt_071614_1), floating power stations (Dgui_062314_1) and cloud seeding (Dg_060914_1). Ghanaian officials generally did not share donors' concern for mitigating climate change (Gt_052614_2), and sustainability was not the driving consideration for evaluating opportunities. This point is demonstrated by the surprising number of government explanations about the benefits of adding coal-fired plants without much, or sometimes any, discussion of the environmental costs (Gt_052914_1; Gt_052214_1; Gt_061314_1; Dg_050514_2). The government has included a commitment to increase the share of renewable energy in the mix (Gt_052614_1; LB-LM-9-052914), but this effort was siloed within particular agencies in the MOEP and was drowned out by the insistence on developing capacity as quickly as possible (LB-LM-1-052714).

Thus, the common theme in many government statements was the progress made in finding new foreign investors and building new power plants. For example, the government pointed to a new 1,000 MW thermal plant in a joint venture with US-based General Electric, which would be powered by cheaper LNG. The government had also partnered to build two new solar plants, one in Western region (155 MW) and one in Navrongo (2 MW) in the northern part of the country. Government officials also announced new MOUs with the UAE for a new power plant (350 MW) and a visit by an investment team from Mauritius. The Ghanaian government was working with anyone, from the Chinese (Gt_071414_2) to the Americans (Dg_052114_2), to build power plants as fast as possible (LB-LM-7-052914).

One problem they faced in courting this foreign investment, however, was the history of heavy state subsidisation of electricity and tariffs that failed to reflect the actual costs of service. President Mahama spoke on the need to increase electricity tariffs in order to make Ghana more attractive for independent power plant investors in terms of their potential revenue generation (Gt_052914_1). Where Nkrumah lauded Ghanaians as citizens with a right to electricity, contemporary government officials bemoaned them as unrealistic customers, who had been getting away with paying unnaturally low prices for way too long (LB-LM-8-052714). In a discussion of the prospects of new power plants, government officials contended that consumers needed to ‘pay realistic prices for power’ (Gt_071114_1).

In addition to seeing Ghanaians as unjustly spoiled customers, government officials also moralised that they were wasteful (Dg_051214_3). One VRA official explained how overnight mobile phone charging of multiple phones wasted as much electricity as produced at Bui Dam (Dg_051214_3). Hence, government officials also proposed energy conservation as a response to the problem (Gt_050714_1). According to a private newspaper, the ECG claimed that ‘a ‘dumsor-free’ World Cup would only be possible if consumers switched off gadgets like freezers and air-conditioners' (Dgui_061614_1). This statement portrayed Ghanaians as the primary threat to World Cup viewing due to their frivolous use of electricity.

Ghanaian government officials went even further, however, to the point of criminalising Ghanaians. Discussions about expanding the national grid were no longer proud accounts about the state's ability to grant access to all of its citizens, but, instead, watchful worries about how to prevent dishonest customers from taking advantage of the services illegally. For example, when the MOEP announced how the government was connecting to the grid a new community in the Sekyere Afram Plains in the Ashanti region, the official described how the streetlights, which were connected in the first phase, would be disconnected after two weeks ‘to avoid the situation whereby residents would indulge in illegal wiring’ (Dg_051014_1). The solutions offered by Ghanaian government officials emphasised discouraging, arresting and prosecuting Ghanaians who had made illegal connections (Gt_052214_1; Gt_050814_1) or did not pay their bills (Gt_061314_1).

The rationale for government action had changed significantly from Nkrumah's broad prioritisation of the development of Ghana's economy and its citizens, to a more narrow focus on facilitating the growth of foreign and domestic companies. Government elites consistently mentioned the value of business and their commitment to private sector initiatives.

In sum, Ghanaian government elites today avoided blame and focused on global or international causes for the problem of energy security. Officials worked feverishly to attract foreign investors to generate more capacity for foreign and domestic business use, dismissing Ghanaians frequently as consumers, rather than citizens, who had illegal connections, unpaid bills and needed to stop wasting energy.

Ghanaian Citizens Expect Electricity as a Right of National Citizenship but Face the Limits of Customer Service in a Neoliberal Era

Where Ghanaian government officials described a challenge, Ghanaian citizens decried much more dramatically the ‘energy crisis that had engulfed the country’ (Dg_051714_1). Furthermore, where often government officials recounted dispassionately the challenge of a shortfall in electricity as a narrow and technical problem in the energy sector, Ghanaian citizens often emotionally criticised what they saw as an interlocking, multi-sectoral problem of public service delivery, not just in energy, but also water and the economy as a whole. For example, the civil society group, the Concerned Ghanaians for Responsible Government protested failing infrastructure which they described as ‘a plethora of chaos plaguing Ghana's socio-economy including: erratic supply of electricity, unreliable supply of water …’ (Dgui_072314_1).

Not only was the energy crisis much more acute to Ghanaians, the Ghanaian government was squarely to blame. Ghanaians attributed responsibility to ‘non-performing, inept and corrupt officials' (Dgui_072314_1). Even a representative of a small business selling solar power agreed that electricity provision was primarily a government responsibility (LB-LM-10-053014). Notably, the designation of responsibility was not usually done in partisan terms. While interviewees expressed frustration at government action or inaction to address the crisis, they rarely mentioned party politics. In fact, one respondent with broad experience with the electricity sector in Ghana and other African countries suggested that citizens' expectations about electricity access transcended party lines ‘because we're all Ghanaians’ (LB-13-060314). Instead, these popular expectations were sustained by regular and competitive democratic elections. One governmental official described it as follows: ‘Politicians promise a lot! Every four years, you hear that they are going to expand the grid and provide electricity to everyone. People are hopeful. They expect it will arrive. But some people are still waiting’ (LB-LM-8-052714).

Since Ghanaian citizens viewed the problem in broader terms as a multi-sectoral failure of government, the proposals for action were political, involving comprehensive reform of the government itself. Importantly, these proposals targeted the entire government, not just one ministry. For example, the Concerned Ghanaians called for ‘the present government to be fiscally responsible, monetarily wise whilst focusing on time-bound action to bring the Ghanaian economy back on track’ (Dgui_072314_1). A frequent theme was the need to fight corruption in the Ghanaian government in order to realise more effective service delivery to its citizens. When the Trades Union Congress organised a protest in late July 2014, they pushed to stamp out corruption in high office (Dgui_072614_1). Similarly, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) protesters in Kumasi in mid-June held up signs that not only demanded ‘Light now, not 2016’ but also to ‘Stop the Corruption’ (Gt_061114_1).

The rationale for action according to the Ghanaians was clearly framed in terms of their rights as citizens in the nation. It is clear that Ghanaians conceptualised electricity as a public good that was intrinsically tied to the nation. The grid was always invoked as the ‘national grid’ or ‘national electricity grid’; it was never described simply as ‘the grid’ or even ‘the central grid’ (Gt_052914_1; Gt_060714_1). Ghanaians also consistently highlighted the reciprocal duties and rights between the state and its citizens when they discussed electricity provision. For example, in one angry editorial, the author was frustrated by what he viewed as the Mahama administration's incompetence to fulfil its duties to the Ghanaian people. He rebuked:

Meanwhile, in another editorial, it is clear that the reciprocal agreement between the government and the people was strained, but the disappointment of these expectations was not highlighted in the name of a particular administration: ‘The poor generation of power, leading to the planned power outages, is one of the low points of the government's service delivery to the people and the earlier this problem is fixed, the better it will enhance the government's move to fulfil its contract with the people’ (Dg_052114_1).The conceptualisation of electricity provision as a national right was further reinforced by the symbolism of organising protests in the name of ‘Ghanaians’ on key national holidays such as the 54th anniversary of the Ghanaian Republic.

Discussion: The Disconnect between Government Objectives and Citizen Expectations Spurs Protest and the Government Responds

This analysis of how key actors conceptualised the problem, responsible parties, potential solutions, and rationale for action on the eve of the 2014 World Cup in Ghana reveals the changing construction of service provision and citizenship in Ghana. Ghanaian government officials were not motivated to increase generation capacity because of the threat of urban interests or donor pressure. Indeed, the actions taken by Ghanaian government officials benefited rural and urban communities at the expense of a major company. Furthermore, while some of Ghana's long-term plans for the electric sector, such as its slow shift toward electric sector liberalisation, were aligned with donor interests, the appeal to donors does not explain Ghana's extraordinary progress in providing grid access to its citizens, nor does it explain the Ghanaian government's actions to keep the televisions on during the World Cup. Neither were the government actions simply due to the political pressure of avid football fans or partisan politics. We argue that it is vital to put this moment in a broader historical context of state and nation-building in Ghana.

The understanding of electricity as a right of national citizenship had been established by Nkrumah immediately prior and after independence in Ghana. The analysis reveals how this view changed in different ways for contemporary Ghanaian elites and citizens, starting with Rawlings' emphasis on ‘self-help’ and persisting through the current electricity crisis. A conflict emerged during this period between the government officials' denigration of Ghanaians as unrealistic, thieving or wasteful customers, and the Ghanaians' own insistence on electricity as a core duty by the government to fulfil its contract with deserving citizens.

In addition to the divergent discourse of the two groups, the salience of the conflict was demonstrated by the intensification of social mobilisation by Ghanaians on this issue. In late May, the National Union of Ghana Students threatened a showdown with the government if utility subsidies were withdrawn. The students feared that their universities would shift the increasing costs to the students, arguing that ‘students will pay the ultimate price’ and government was ‘relinquishing its commitment to students' (Pi_052314_1). On 20 June 2014, the NPP organised a street protest in Kumasi, the party's stronghold, which drew crowds and snarled traffic (Pi_061114_1).Footnote ¹⁴ Calling the demonstration ‘Black Tuesday’, the protesters wore black and red funeral attire and wailed as if grieving the loss of a relative or loved one. The placards read, ‘Mahama will kill Ghanaians with Dumso Dumso’ (Pi_061114_1) and ‘No More Dumsor’.Footnote ¹⁵

In response to the intensification of popular protest, the Ghanaian government responded with a short-term fix to ensure that electricity was available to watch the World Cup games. One Ghanaian official from the Public Utilities Regulatory Commission (PURC) explicitly linked the government efforts to World Cup viewing: ‘These plans are put in place for consumers to watch uninterruptible football matches during the World Cup’ (Seward Reference Seward2014). This was clearly a populist move to appease the growing resistance and popular rejection of government policy objectives and practices.

The short-term nature of the response was evidenced by continued conflicts between government and citizens over electricity provision. The Ghanaian government continued to struggle, even after the 2014 World Cup games, to implement its preferred policy. Despite tremendous pressure from donors and independent power producers to increase the electricity tariff, the regulatory agency repeatedly delayed implementing the increases it had planned. For example, in July 2014, PURC decided not to increase the tariff to 31·56% as planned because of concerns about ‘current challenges facing consumers' (Gt_070414_1). The reality of raising electricity tariffs, especially in the context of continual load shedding was politically too difficult. Faced with these hurdles, the ECG then returned to its focus on consumers and reducing losses through more accurate monitoring and bill payment with the implementation of a new web-based system (Sp_062814_2). At the launch of the new service, the agency officials again warned that those who tapped power lines illegally ‘would be dealt with severely’ (Sp_062814_2).

This conflict continues to spur social protest as well. In July 2014, a letter to the editor expresses frustration that Ghanaians have to pay higher tariffs even though services continued to be interrupted. The writer concludes: ‘Ghanaians will like utility providers to come clean on what they mean by ‘realistic tariffs’. I believe that we have been exploited by these utility providers for far too long. Everything must change’ (Sp_071214_1). As problems of electricity generation and provision persist, Ghanaians have turned to civil society, in an effort to express their frustration with the government and public utility providers. The decision to stage major protests on 6 March 2015, the 58th anniversary of Ghanaian independence, combined with calls to ‘show that we love our country’, once again draw attention to the strong linkage between the ideals of Ghanaian citizenship and the right to reliable public service provision (Dgui_013015_1). In addition, the lack of partisan mobilisation continues to be evident in the statements issued by Concerned Ghanaians, which ‘urged all Ghanaians to put aside their political colours and join in the march’ (Dgui_013015_1).