President Akufo-Addo exchanging pleasantries with some of the trainees in welding from a scholarship in Canada by the support of the Petroleum Commission at the Jubilee House
President Akufo-Addo has welcomed back nine lecturers from various technical universities in the country who were sent to Canada for advanced training in oil and gas.
They included Emmanuel Marcus Abaidoo, Takoradi Technical Institute; Isaac Oppong, Kikam Technical Institute; Daniel Kyei-Kankam, Takoradi Technical University, and Frank Nana Osei, Takoradi Technical University, Abdul Hamid Mohammed, Tamale Technical University; Wise Kwashie Klomegah, Ho Technical University; Samuel Garriba, Cape Coast Technical University, and Gladys Perpetual Awudi, Koforidua Technical University.
They received 11-month training at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology in Edmonton, Canada to become master instructors under the Accelerated Oil and Gas Capacity (AOGC) programme initiated by the lawyer Egbert Faibille-led Petroleum Commission.
Apart from pipefitting, they also have advanced certification in welding, mechanical, technicianship.
At a meeting at the Jubilee House Monday evening, President Akufo-Addo urged the nine and other Ghanaians trained in the oil and gas industry to imbibe their skills in others to help reduce the cost of hiring expatriates which is expensive.
He also urged them to become models of excellence to their students and demonstrate that Ghanaian skills were as good as those anywhere in the world.
“As pioneers, you have the responsibility of ensuring that those coming after you, those you would be training recognised the value of what you had done and the role they had to play in the development of the country,”were his exact words.
He commended them for surviving the cold in Alberta, Canada and assured that government would continue to offer them the maximum support for the industry and the country to reap the maximum value from their training.
On his part, the Chief Executive of the Petroleum Commission, Egbert Faibille Jnr. said since independence, there had never been any technical institutions in the country that could train and certify pipe fitters.
He said anytime there was the need to work on pipe fitting in the upstream oil industry, they had to bring in expatriates at great cost to the nation.
He, therefore, noted that the sponsored training aimed to enable those trained in Canada would rejoin their faculties by next year to offer those courses as standalone disciplines.
Me. Faibille said Ghana stood to benefit from their training in the areas of the petrochemical industry, upstream oil and gas industry, downstream, midstream, medical pipe fitting, and mining pipe fitting a said the commission had obtained a $5 million grant from Aker Energy to build a world-class welding and pipefitting centre at the Takoradi Technical University which might be replicated in clustered regions for the youth to be trained in international standards.
He indicated that the Petroleum Commission had also sponsored the training of 150 young Ghanaians to qualify for the level of City and Guilds International Vocational Certification level 3 technicians in the areas of instrumentation, mechanical were also capable and qualified to work on FPSOs and help reduce the cost of bringing expatriates.
By Charles Takyi-Boadu