Workers of the state only oil refinery, Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) are calling on the Interim Management Committee (IMC) of the company to broaden its tentacles to include the top managers in ongoing investigations in connection with the financial and products losses at the refinery.
According to them, the staff who are currently on interdiction could not act alone as there might be top officials behind their supposed criminal activities.
Some 14 workers of TOR are under investigations over massive rot.
The workers were interdicted for product losses running into over $14million.
Names of the people interdicted are Daniel Osei Appiah, Director of Finance; Abraham Quayson, Head of Production; Julius Ogo at the RFCC; Christopher Boateng, Movement of Product Unit; Daniel Fugah, Production Unit; Kobina Takyi Koomson, Production Unit; Matthew Adu-Gyamfi, Production Unit; William Frimpong, Production Unit, Emmanuel Tetteh Doku, Movement of Production Unit; Edmond Kojo Baiden, Movement of Product Unit; George Kweku Gaisie, Finance Department; Joseph Akure, Finance Department; Abu Osman, Distribution; and Victor Dekayie, Import & Export (Shipping) were the officials reportedly Interdicted by the company.
A three-member Interim Management Committee (IMC) chaired by Ing. Nobert Cormla-Djamposu Aku uncovered the massive rot at the struggling state oil refinery spanning from 2012 till date.
It would be recalled that the IMC was formed after the dismissal of the Managing Director of TOR, Francis Boateng, and his Deputy, Ato Morrison, in June this year.
The IMC was constituted by the Energy Minister, Dr Matthew Opoku Prempeh, to undertake technical and human resource audits as well as receiving and assessing viable partnerships for TOR.
They were said to be working tirelessly and scrutinising the transactions at the refinery since 2012 and uncovering several losses.
Some of the losses include about 105,927 litres of gas oil which belongs to a BDC client on 4th September 2021 suddenly disappeared from the refinery.
Also, between September 21, 2021 and September 25, 2021, there was wrongful loading of 252,000 litres of Aviation Turbine Kerosene (ATK) instead of regular Kerosene into BRV Trucks at the loading gantry.
As if that was not enough, somewhere in April 2021, there was another disappearance of 18 drums of electrical cables worth GHS10.4 million from the Technical Storehouse.
Shockingly, a product, Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) belonging to a client between 2012 and 2015 also disappeared and this has resulted in TOR indebted to the client to the tune of $4.8 million, as confirmed by an Ernst and Young audit.
Issuance of unauthorized letter, admitting debt liability to TOR with attendant computation of interest without the approval of IMC.
Loss Of Naphtha To BDC Client
Speaking on the issue in an interview with DGN Online, Bernard Owusu, National Chairman of the General Transport Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union of TUC Ghana is asking the IMC to also look out for the top executives behind the criminal activities at the refinery.
According to him, the IMC shouldn’t target individuals or whatever but they should be transparent and ensure that the right thing is done by looking at the top too, the General Managers as well because the general managers give instructions to the managers, junior staff and others.
“So if they are interdicting the senior and junior staff and managers, then what about the general managers so we want to see the action against the general managers who are involved.”
He assured the workers that the National union was solidly behind them to ensure that the right thing was done and nobody was victimised.
He admonished the workers to cooperate fully with the IMC investigation.
By Vincent Kubi