SOPCL Abrogates Contract

THE Saltpond Offshore Producing Company Limited (SOPCL) has abrogated its contract with Ocean & Oil, a Nigeria-based oil company, for charging arbitrary charter fees.

SOPCL, which hitherto paid $9,000 daily for offloading crude oil into MT Asterias 1, a vessel owned by Ocean & Oil, has contracted Messrs Kingdom Holdings Limited of the Isle of Man in the United Kingdom, which has agreed to charge a lesser fee to offload oil produced at the Saltpond Oilfields in the Central Region.

In an interview in Accra, the Director of Legal Services and Administration of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Mr Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, said Kingdom Holdings Limited has agreed to charge $7,000 daily as charter fee.

He said the new MT African Wave vessel, which is expected to store crude oil produced at Saltpond Oilfields, is capable of holding thousands of barrels of crude oil.

Ocean & Oil Limited, owners of MT Asterias 1, exercised a lien over the cargo for non-payment of accumulated charter fees, totalling $1.915 million, by SOPCL two months ago. He said the SOPCL has issued letters of credit totalling $1.915 million to settle its indebtedness to Ocean & Oil by selling the crude oil contained in MT Asterias 1 to the latter.

The crude oil, which is equivalent to the debt owed by SOPCL, was returned on Sunday evening and is expected to be sold to an oil company in Cote d’Ivoire.

Mr Afriyie explained that Ocean & Oil is not expected to return to the country after selling the oil because “we have settled all our debts and we are, therefore, not looking forward to doing business with them”.

Samples of the returned oil, which was assessed by Messrs Q & Q Limited, an inspection company at the Tema Oil Refinery’s (TOR) laboratories, have been certified as “genuine saltpond crude oil.”

The vessel, its crew and the returned oil have been cleared by the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) and the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS) and left Ghana’s shores on Wednesday, June 4,2003, Mr Afriyie said.

He explained that production of oil at the Saltpond Oilfields stopped the vessel moved without notice, resulting in a the public outcry generated.

“Now that the furore is over and the Ghanaian public has witnessed that neither the government nor the GNPC had stolen the oil as was alleged, production will resume in earnest,” Mr Afriyie stressed.