Ghana makes me sick sometimes. Electricity for 35M people surely can't be that hard to work out
This electricity story is actually crazy when you understand it.
Ghana has private companies producing some of our electricity and supplying gas. The problem is, the electricity sector has repeatedly not brought in enough money to cover what it costs to run.
So the unpaid bills pile up. By the end of 2024, the IMF says Ghana owed power producers and fuel suppliers more than $2 billion.
In 2025, the NDC government put about $1.47 billion into dealing with some of these energy obligations, including old power debts, gas bills and restoring a World Bank guarantee that had been used up.
That is progress but imagine earning GH¢5,000 every month while your household keeps costing GH¢7,000.
Someone can clear your old debt today. If you don’t fix that GH¢2,000 gap, you’ll be in debt again.
That is basically Ghana’s electricity problem. So paying the debt is good but fixing why we keep creating the debt is even more important. Otherwise another government will come and give us another PowerPoint explaining another billion dollars.
Please, break the cycle 👍🏾