Ghana: GTPCWU Demands Full Scale Investigation Of Immediate Past TOR Board

The General Transport Petroleum Chemical Workers Union (GTPCWU) is calling on President John Dramani Mahama to establish an independent committee to investigate the activities of the immediate-past board of directors of Tema Oil Refinery (TOR).

The union alleges that the former TOR board, comprising Mr. Apenteng, Mrs. Sapara Grant and Mr. Ato Morisson, made decisions driven by personal interests that had adverse financial consequences.

The GTPCWU claims that the board engaged in non-transparent transactions with affiliates of the previous government.

Addressing a press conference in Accra on Wednesday, 22nd January 2024, the National Chairman of GTPCWU and Chairman of TUC, Brother Bernard Owusu, highlighted the offences of the board members.

He indicated that the board was negligent by engaging Decimal Capital-VITOL in a joint partnership with TOR, even when VITOL had written to the Energy Ministry about not having such an arrangement (financial and technical support) with Decimal Capital.

Continuing, he said the board also engineered the incorporation of a special purpose vehicle – Torentco Asset Management Limited – by the shareholders of Decimal Capital to cover up all its structural irregularities and flaws identified by the union executives.

“With the above-failed attempts, TOR BOD colluded with the shareholder of Torentco Asset Management Limited, Mr. Michael Darko, and Mr. Christopher Hesse-Tetteh, including some compromised workers of TOR, to incorporate the Tema Energy and Processing Limited in August 2023. These TOR workers were made to incorporate a company limited by guarantee named TOR Workers Charity Trust for 20% shares in Tema Energy and Processing Limited without the knowledge or approval of TOR Management and Workers,” he said.

Brother Bernard Owusu also called for investigation into the removal and resignation of all objective and astute general managers and the subsequent reassignments of incorruptible managers and officers for those whom the TOR BOD could easily manipulate.

He further called for review of promotions of all five workers involved in the incorporation of TOR.

Concluding, Mr. Owusu also demanded an investigation into the processes leading to the TOR BOD issuance of Request For-Proposal (RFP) and the supposed signed agreement with NETOIL.

“As a UNION with an oversight responsibility over the workers of TOR, GTPCWU has written to key stakeholders, including the Attorney General’s Office, the Office of the Special Prosecutor, State Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA), the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Energy in respect of TOR’S partnership with all the above entities, raising every identified irregularities,” he said.

“Notably, the response from the Attorney General to GTPCWU substantiated our concerns about the lack of capacity and transparency in the transaction. Additionally, findings by the Special Prosecutor raised significant irregularities that necessitated instructions to halt the Tema Energy and Processing transaction. While we acknowledge the importance of private participation or the dilution of the ownership structure of TOR for private participation in TOR’s transformational agenda, we believe it should not be a ruse for state asset exploitation and misappropriation,” he added.

Source: https://energynewsafrica.com