SEOUL, South Korea - Ghana has approached two South Korean companies, including top refiner SK Corp., to sell a stake in its state-owned oil refinery, the Korean firms said on Thursday.
Ghana contacted SK Corp. and trading firm Samsung Corp. about the sale of the government's holdings in the state oil refinery, but no new developments had occurred, the two companies said in separate filings to the Korea Exchange.
Ghana's finance minister, Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu, said in March in an interview with Reuters the West African country would partially privatise its sole oil refinery and two other state-owned firms this year as part of plans to raise $6 billion for infrastructure development.
Ghana's state-owned Tema Oil Refinery meets about 80-85 percent of the country's demand for petrol products, and it plans to more than double its capacity to 100,000 barrels per day to capture a bigger slice of the regional market.
SK Corp., which controls nearly a third of South Korea's oil market, has a refining capacity of 1.115 million barrels per day, including that of newly-acquired SK Incheon Oil, formerly Inchon Oil Refinery Co. Ltd.
Shares of SK Corp. fell 1.25 percent at 63,000 won, against a 1.72 percent loss in the benchmark stock index Samsung's shares rose 0.4 percent to 25,100 won.
