Improve TOR’s operations to attract strategic investors – COPEC to government

Government must revamp the operations of the Tema Oil Refinery if it intends to boost investor confidence for its strategic petroleum hub, the Chamber of Petroleum Consumers has said.

According to the executive secretary of the chamber, the present position of TOR does not offer an attractiveness for investors to participate.

Duncan Amoah speaking to Citi Business News explained, “If I were a private investor, would I want to put in US$60 billion in a country whose only refinery it cannot even manage? These are questions that would be asked in and around the petroleum hub discussion and I’m quite sure that no matter how much government equity funding would be; whichever private funding will be coming in will also be interested in exactly how we intend to protect whatever resources they will be dumping in here.”

Meanwhile, some union workers of the refinery last week demanded the dissolution of the current board of TOR.

According to them, the board and its management have shown very little commitment to the refinery's operations and a lack of a sense of urgency in improving the fortunes of the refinery.

Chairperson of the Ghana Transport, Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union, Serwaa Duncan-Williams, has also claimed that, the board failed to secure partnerships from several investors who had shown interest in expanding the refinery’s capacity between 100,000 to 150,000 barrels per stream day (BPSD).

Also, Deputy Minister of Energy in charge of the petroleum sector, Dr Mohammed Amin Adam, under the governing Akufo-Addo administration disclosed that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) inherited a debt of US$345 million at TOR from the erstwhile National Democratic Congress (NDC) under former president John Mahama.