Ghana top Stories and Latest News

The British High Commissioner to Ghana, lain Walker, has said that the Volta Region has the potential to become a haven for competitive cycling and serves as a pull factor for local and foreign enthusiasts, due to its unique landscape. He said the Region’s “astonishing” wealth of landscapes could make it popular for professional cyclists and tourists. The High Commissioner made the observation when he paid a courtesy call on Togbe Afede XIV, Agbogbomefia of Asogli State and his elders in Ho on Friday, May 28. “If this were to be France, it would have been a haven for cycling,” he said. Mr Walker commended Togbe Afede for his commitment to sports development, which helped to revive competitive football in the country and opportunities for the youth and children. He said the two nations had sustained rigid bonds over the decades and added that the culture and spectacular landscape of the Volta Region were areas to be considered for long-term collaboration. Read more...

Sunon Asogli, an Independent Power Producer is set to enter the Liberia power industry. This follows a visit by Togbe Afede XIV, the Agbogbomefia of the Asogli State, founder and a Director of Sunon Asogli Power (Gh) Ltd and a 4-member investment and technical team to Monrovia, the Liberian capital, to negotiate a deal in the power generation sector in the West African country. Explaining his offering to the government of Liberia, he said t the  first of the three-pronged offering seeks to acquire an interest in the existing 88 megwatts Mt Coffee Hydro Power Plant in Liberia. Secondly, the investment is to expand the existing Mt Coffee Hydro Power Plant by 60-80MW in a ‘BOO or BOOT’ mode in the medium term. The third offering, according to him, in the long term is to develop a new hydro power plant on the St. Paul River to add to the generation capacity of Liberia.

Touching on the expected benefits of the investment to the country, he revealed that the acquired interest in the existing Mt. Coffee Hydro Power Plant is to provide capital that will help government fix the challenged power distribution sector of the electricity supply value chain. Read more...

Principals of Colleges of Education across Ghana have threatened to shut down the schools by the end of May if the government does not release funds for the maintenance of students’ stay on campus. All 46 Colleges of Education in Ghana could be affected as the authorities say they have not been paid feeding grants since the start of the academic year in January. President of the Conference of Principals of Colleges of Education, Emmanuel Nyamekye in an exclusive interview with JoyNews’ Fred Smith said the only option available to them is for the students to go home. “If nothing is done in the next couple of weeks, we may be compelled to ask our students to go home,” he said. Lamenting their difficulties, he said food suppliers for the schools have ceased due to arrears owed from as far back as the first term.

He, therefore, called on the government to take immediate actions, “because once the suppliers fail to supply, there’s very little we can do under the circumstance.” “We cannot go to the open market and buy so our suppliers have the trump card and until we get some money to at least appease them, they would not give us any food items and when that happens, we can’t feed our students,” he apprised. Read more...

The Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) has published a schedule for the disruption in power supply in parts of the Greater Accra Region. In a press statement dated May 20, the company indicated that the power interruption is to enable ongoing system improvement at the Kasoa Bulk Supply Point (BSP). “As part of projects to improve power supply reliability and system voltage, the  Electricity Campany of Ghana in collaboration with the Ghana Grid Company (GRIDCo) will undertake interruption in power supply to facilitate to work of contractors at various stages and times.” 

It further pointed out that the Kasoa BSP requires the re-construction of a section of GRIDCo’s 161kv Winneba to Mallam transmission lines tie-in works, hence the need to shut down the transmission line, which will affect power supplies to many households. According to the ECG, the improvement works will last for a period of sixteen days starting from Thursday, May 27 to June 11, 2021. Read more...

Technical Universities across the country are being urged to be more innovative by going beyond publishing academic papers for promotion but rather direct their focus on commercializing research output. Coordinator of the Industry and Innovation Unit of the Directorate of Research, Innovation and Consultancy at the University of Cape Coast, Mr. Isaac Nketsiah indicated that this was the only way the technical universities can remain relevant and be more agile and responsive to the challenges in 21st-century universities. Speaking on the management of Intellectual Property (IP) in Contemporary Research at Green Building Research Conference hosted by the Cape Coast Technical University, Mr. Nketsiah underscored the need for the Technical Universities to develop the intellectual property framework to guide their research and scholarly works and enable them to generate income from the commercialization of their works.

He further expressed concern about how most universities in Africa still engage in teaching and basic research activities whilst missing out on opportunities for breakthroughs in groundbreaking discoveries and solutions for most of the continent’s challenges. Read more...

Ghana has overtaken Nigeria and Tanzania as the 4th largest African destination from the USA, in terms of travelers, ForwardKeys travel industry trends, an aviation tracker, has revealed. This follows the re-launch of passenger flight operations from Washington to Accra by United Airlines over the weekend. Ghana increased the year-on-year growth by 44.5%. “Ghana, Cape Verde, and Togo are standout performers currently. This is mainly due to the strong interest from VFR/Expat passengers,” ForwardKeys said. However, South Africa and Morocco are set to be the most popular destinations in terms of US traveler volumes this summer.

Morocco was recently excluded from the USA ‘Do Not Travel’ Advisory, so this may encourage more people to travel to the destination, it explained. South Africa, Morocco and Kenya were ranked 1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively.  Nigeria, Tanzania and Cape Verde were 4th, 5th and 6th in that order. It said USA travelers are booking to fly from the Caribbean to Iceland and now the air ticketing data shows that they are also keen to travel to long-haul destinations in Africa and the Middle East. Despite USA CDC warnings, ForwardKeys said Africa and the Middle East are proving to be standout performers, ahead of the summer.

The US Ambassador to Ghana, Stephanie S. Sullivan recently said the United States  of America will further deepen its bilateral relationship with Ghana. Read more...

President Akufo-Addo, on Sunday, said until the country vaccinated the requisite number of Ghanaians and achieve herd immunity, the Imposition of Restrictions Act, 2020 (Act 1012), will remain in force. He said enforcing restrictions as the mandatory and safety protocols, would help return life to normalcy, and the security agencies would not relent in their efforts to enforce it. President Akufo-Addo, in his 25th televised address to the nation on measures taken against the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, encouraged the public to continue to adhere to the safety protocols since the reward for compliance had led to favorable scenarios in the fight against the pandemic, and resulted in the easing of some earlier restrictions. He indicated that the country had seen a marked reduction in active cases (persons who currently have the virus), from 5,444 persons as at February 26, 2021 to 1,314 as at May 11, 2021. Again, the rate of infection had dropped significantly from 400 a day since his last address to the nation, to less than 100 now, and the number of persons who had recovered from the virus had also increased from 77,972 to 91,146 within the same period, he said. Read more...

Energy Minister, Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh, has described all 40 Power Purchasing Agreements (PPAs) signed under former President John Mahama’s administration amid the power crisis between 2013 and 2016, as desperate and costly.  According to him, these “costly” PPAs subsequently shot up power tariffs by over 200%. In dealing with this, Dr. Opoku Prempeh told the media three of these PPAs have been deferred under a renegotiated Take and Pay arrangement. This according to him saves Ghana US$1.4 billion dollars each year. “Some of the things that killed us were PPAs done desperately. We have learnt our lessons, going forward, it can’t be business as usual. There’s a moratorium on any further PPAs. We won’t sign, take or pay business again. Now we have moved on to the second phase to signing new take and pay PPAs. We will only pay for the electricity we use.” please read more...

- The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers – Ghana (COPEC) has announced the increment in fuel prices by May 17, 2021 - The Executive Sectary of COPEC, Duncan Amoah, has said the increment has necessary because the commodity has increased in the international market - In a signed statement, COPEC has released the new prices. The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers – Ghana (COPEC), has revealed that fuel prices will witness an increase in the next few hours. The Executive Secretary of the chamber, Duncan Amoah, in a signed statement, said this has become necessary due to the increase of petroleum prices on the international market. He said the commodity was sold at $520 per metric tonne has now been pegged at about $545 per metric tonne. This, the statement says, translates to about 8 cedis per litre at the pump for both petrol and diesel, or about 5% on the international price index. The above-mentioned figures make about a 1.25% increase in the current pump prices. Meanwhile, the new increase is coming just 10 days after fuel prices were increased so that it sparked the social media trend #fixthecountry. The National Petroleum Authority (NPA), in response to the public outcry, reduced fuel prices by 8 pesewas per litre at the pump. This took effect on Wednesday, May 5, 2021, according to a communique issued on Tuesday, May 4, 2021. The reduction meant that the recent 17 pesewas increase per litre announced by the NPA has been reduced by 9 pesewas per litre. Read more...

Last night, United Airlines launched the first flight of its new service to Accra, Ghana, from Washington DC, United States, operated by Boeing 787-8 registered N27901. The carrier will now operate a three-weekly service to Accra from Dulles International, Symply Flying reported. Flight UA996 will depart Dulles International Airport at 18:15 every Sunday, Wednesday and Friday and land at Kotoka International Airport at 08:40 the next morning. On return, UA997 is expected to depart Accra at 23:45 on Monday, Thursday and Saturday and arrive in the Washington area at 06:30 the next day. There is a large Ghanaian diaspora, with around four million people with ties to the country across the world. Notably, the United States has over 116,000 Ghanaians living in the country. This figure gives the United States the third largest Ghanaian population in the world. So, many people will want to fly to and from Ghana as a result of the challenges of the pandemic. Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Chairman and CEO Jack Potter explained how valuable this service is to the Ghanaian capital. This operation is one of several direct flights to cities around the world from Dulles. The Chicago-based carrier followed Delta Air Lines with its earlier arrival in Accra from New York the day before. Read more...

 The load shedding exercise in some parts of the Greater Accra Region is expected to end today, Monday, May 17, 2021. The intermittent supply of electricity exercise began on Monday, May 10, 2021. The Electricity Company of Ghana said the power outages have become necessary to allow for maintenance works, particularly at the Pokuase Bulk Supply Point. ECG explained that the maintenance works at the Pokuase Bulk Supply Point will require that the station's 330kv line is shut down completely. The shutdown will also affect power supply reliability to the Mallam Bulk Supply Point (BSP). The outages will rotate between day and night from 6 am to 6 pm and 6 pm to 6 am for eight days. While some of the areas will sleep in darkness for two nights and have their power off for two days during the day in May, others will sleep in darkness for three nights and have their power off for just one day. Others will also sleep in darkness for three nights and have powered off for just one day. Read more...