I wasn’t fired because of controversial fuel sale to Movenpina – Ex BOST boss

A former Managing Director (MD) of the Bulk Oil Storage and Transport Company (BOST), Alfred Obeng Boateng, has rejected suggestions that he was fired because of the controversy that surrounded the sale of contaminated fuel to a private company in 2017.

According to Mr Obeng Boateng, who is now the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Bibiani-Anhwiaso-Bekwai in the Western North Region, there was no way he could have been fired on that basis because he did no wrong.

He makes the point that the termination of the contract by President Nana Akufo-Addo in 2018 and not 2017 showed that his removal had nothing to do with that incident.

Mr. Obeng Boateng was sacked by President Akufo-Addo in June 2018 along with the bosses of the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority, the Korlebu Teaching Hospital, and The Ghana Export Promotion Authority (GEPA).

He was asked to handover to George Mensah Okley, an energy expert, who later became the substantive MD.

He maintains that time has proven that despite the many criticisms and attacks on his person both within and without, he was of no blemish except that people often hold that erroneous view that the moment there is an allegation against a public officer, then the assumption is that that person is guilty.

Mr. Obeng Boateng who is the CEO of Approachers Group of Companies pointed out that an audit that was conducted on his administration selling of the said contaminated fuel to so-called unlicensed company, Movenpiina indicated that the fuel was intact as at the time he was he acted as the MD.

He was also said to have been cleared by the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI), according to the then Energy Minister Boakye Agyarko who had set up a committee to investigate the sale.

“But the fuel was there, I left the fuel. The fuel we were trying to sell, there was a good reason to dispose of, just that people felt that once you are a public officer and there is an allegation, people think that there is a wrongdoing.

But at the end of the day, when my successor came, he conducted an audit and they all confirmed the product was there”, he told Lexis Bell of Joy FM on his Drive Time show segment Personality Profile.

In his view, he was relieved of his position because of the backlash and the way and many of these attacks were making the NPP unpopular.

“The attacks were so many and you cannot also one person make your party unpopular and again I think there were things that the President saw that I didn’t even think about at the time.

That, being there, the way people were attacking you, if you are not careful, they can destroy your image, if you are not careful, you can even die, That is why when my termination came, I wrote a letter to thank my President because those contamination issues happened in 2027 so if that had any connection with the termination of my appointment then the appointment would have been in 2017 but not June 2018, a year later when I have been vindicated”.

He continued “When you are summarily dismissed or sacked that is when there is a problem but when your appointment is terminated with a reason that they want to do restructuring and therefore they brought somebody from the Ministry of Energy that they felt that he had been in the industry for years and he could be able to do that restructuring”.