Energy Minister Matthew Opoku-Prempeh has commended the Volta River Authority (VRA) for its role in the government’s electricity expansion drive.

He said the VRA has been crucial in helping the government achieve an electricity penetration rate of 88.58% across the country.

“The government’s agenda to continue extending electricity to every part of the county is on course,” he said. “We are currently at 88.58 percentage and want to reach 90% by the time President Akufo-Addo will be leaving office. And the VRA has been very effective on this agenda. The VRA is doing very well and I think we should clap for them.”

Mr. Opoku-Prempeh made the remarks when he took his turn at the Meet-the-Press series held in Accra on Thursday.

He also responded to calls by some Ghanaians for VRA to resettle victims of the Akosombo dam spillage. He said the VRA has so far been on top of the issue and that resettlement should be left in the hands of the inter-ministerial committee looking into the matter.

According to him, the inter-ministerial committee will make their recommendations to parliament on the resettlement issue for the House to consider.

Meanwhile, the President of the Ghana Institute of Engineering, Ing. Kwabena Bempong, has praised the VRA for the good engineering decisions it made to balance preserving the integrity of the Akosombo dam and preventing the loss of lives in the recently ended controlled spilling of the dam.

He praised the Authority at the recent dialogue held between the Ghana Institute of Engineering and VRA.