President John Dramani Mahama has assured Ghanaians that recent power outages across parts of the country are the result of ongoing system upgrades and not a return to the prolonged electricity crisis popularly known as “dumsor”.

The President’s remarks come amid growing public concern over intermittent power supply, with some residents fearing a relapse into the erratic outages that previously affected homes and businesses nationwide.

During a visit to the Northern Electricity Distribution Company (NEDCo) as part of his “Resetting Ghana” tour, President Mahama explained that the disruptions are tied to a nationwide effort to improve electricity distribution infrastructure and enhance long-term reliability.

He disclosed that government has procured about 2,500 transformers under the first phase of a broader intervention aimed at replacing ageing and overloaded equipment across the country.

“I’ll appeal to our people. The outages you are facing are not ‘dumsor.’ It is to enable you to get better quality and stable power. Any time transformers are being replaced, people in affected areas should be informed so they are aware their lights will be off for a while,” he said.

The President noted that many of the country’s existing transformers have become inadequate due to rapid population growth and expanding communities, citing instances where equipment installed decades ago can no longer meet current demand.

He expressed optimism that the ongoing upgrades would significantly stabilise power supply once completed, adding that the exercise would be sustained in phases to ensure continuous improvement in service delivery.

Highlighting the role of local industry, President Mahama welcomed the increasing production of transformers within Ghana, describing it as a step towards building domestic capacity in the energy sector.

“One of the things I’m happy about is that a lot of these transformers are made in Ghana. It helps multiply the benefits for our country. I look forward to the day when all our transformers will be produced locally, helping us fully stabilise the power situation in our country,” he added.

The President also called on both Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and NEDCo to improve their responsiveness to customer complaints, stressing the need for faster fault resolution and better communication with consumers.

“NEDCo, ECG, we must now improve our customer response time. And so we need a system where when customers call, there’s a quick response to either rectify faults,” he urged.

For his part, the Minister for Energy and Green Transition, John Abdulai Jinapor, said the rollout of the new transformers had already begun in several parts of the country, including Tamale, Accra and Tema, with further installations planned for Kumasi and other regions.

He explained that the exercise is designed to address overloaded transformers, reduce outages and improve overall system stability, adding that the first phase of the programme is expected to run for three months before transitioning into medium- and long-term targets.

The minister appealed to the public to remain patient during the upgrade works, assuring that customers would be notified in advance of planned outages.

Together, the interventions form part of a wider government strategy to modernise Ghana’s electricity distribution network, improve reliability and prevent a recurrence of past power supply challenges.