Ghana’s President, Nana Akufo-Addo, has assured the country that his administration will do everything possible to revive the ailing Tema Oil Refinery (TOR).
He gave the assurance when he commissioned Sentuo Refinery, a newly constructed Chinese-owned refinery in Tema in the Greater Accra Region.
“The challenges of another domestic oil refinery, the Tema Oil Refinery, are well documented. Nonetheless, I want to assure the Ghanaian people that the government remains committed to the full operationalization of TOR, and we will stop at nothing to bring it back on stream so that, together with Sentuo, more and more of our oil will be refined right here in Ghana,” the President said.
Tema Oil Refinery, a 45,000 per stream day capacity, was established in 1963 during the regime of late Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s first president, when the country was not a commercial oil producer.
The West African nation was, however, fortunate to discover oil in commercial quantity in 2007 and has since developed the upstream sector with a current production hovering around 150,000 barrels per day.
Unfortunately, the refinery is ill and Ghana continues to spend US$400 million monthly to import refined petroleum products from Europe and the Middle East, and this puts pressure on the local currency, the Cedi.
Since assuming office in 2017, the Akufo-Addo government has been making effort to revamp the ailing refinery but it has not yielded positive results.
In 2022, the Board of Tema Oil Refinery initiated a process to get a strategic partner to bring back the refinery but it has since been fraught with controversies due to a lack of transparency in the whole process.
Recently, the Board of TOR interdicted two executives of the General Transport Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union (GTPCWU) for speaking to the media over the issue.
Many Ghanaians have wondered if the refinery could be brought back on stream as President Akufo-Addo assured.
The citizens, thus, took to President Akufo-Addo’s Facebook page to question him about the fate of Tema Oil Refinery.
Source: https://energynewsafrica.com
