Story: Rose Hayford Darko & Della Russel Ocloo
WORKERS of the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) say the removal of Dr Kwame Ampofo as Managing Director of the refinery alone will not solve the problems of the ailing refinery.
They insisted that the action could only succeed if it was backed by a firm resolve not to use the refinery to process crude brought in by the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC).
Dr Ampofo’s turbulent 11-month tenure in an acting capacity ended yesterday when he was dismissed from office and replaced with Mr Ato Ampiah, one-time Managing Director of GHAMOT.
A government statement signed by the Communications Director at the Presidency, Mr Koku Anyidoho, gave no reasons for the action, but in recent times workers of TOR have been agitating for the removal of Dr Ampofo, the management, the entire board of directors of the company, as well as the Energy Minister, Dr Joe Oteng-Adjei, for various allegations, including incompetence and corruption.
Reacting to the change at the helm of affairs at the refinery, the workers said it had not altered their resolve to resist attempts to use the refinery to refine crude oil brought in by the GNPC.
Speaking to the Daily Graphic in Tema, the Chairman of the TOR Workers Union, Mr Albert Pinto, said workers of the refinery were not happy with events at the plant and appealed to the President to “trickle down his action to the real problems of TOR and not personalities”.
He emphasised that workers would resist the new appointment if it was to impose on the workers a person who would yield to pressure from the GNPC to use the plant as a tolling place where it would refine crude and pay low rates.
The Secretary of the workers union, Mr Gideon Avorgbedor, explained that there had not been any communication to the workers on the removal of Dr Ampofo and his replacement.
He said on hearing the announcement on air, executive members of the union conferred among themselves to confirm if all the others had heard it.
Mr Avorgbedor noted that the workers were convinced that the President had taken steps to act on their calls but added that they felt it was not what they needed that had been done for them.
He stated that the workers were of the view that Dr Ampofo was not alone in implementing the decision to allow the GNPC to refine crude at the plant at GNPC’s own determined rate.
He said the workers would be ready to work with any one put in Dr Ampofo’s position but they would vehemently resist any attempt to give in to pressure from some “powers that be”.
Explaining why the workers were against the GNPC and its operations at the plant, Mr Avorgbedor said TOR was a profit- making company, as envisioned by Dr Kwame Nkrumah when he inaugurated the plant.
He said when the plant processed between 900 and one million barrels of crude in a month, it made a profit of between $7 and $9 million, but the GNPC 's contract was to yield lesser amounts to be determined also by the GNPC for TOR to do the same work.
At the time of the Daily Graphic’s visit to the premises, scores of workers were seen in groups discussing the latest development.
The Vice-Chairman of the Senior Staff Association of TOR, Mr Daniel Fugar, also told the Daily Graphic that dismissing Dr Ampofo had never been a core issue in the workers’ agitation and that rather the GNPC’s continuous exertion of influence had been the major headache the workers had been grappling with.
“If his dismissal was orchestrated owing to his resistance to the tolling arrangement, then the government’s continued preaching of rescuing the refinery is a failed initiative,” he said.
The capability to manage and direct affairs at the refinery by the former legislator, who assumed the hot seat in an acting capacity some 11 months ago, was constantly called into question in the wake of the unavailability of crude for the refinery to operate at full pegging.
Attempts to reach Dr Ampofo on the latest development proved futile, as his mobile phone had been switched off.
The workers who had in the past called for his removal recently renewed their call for the removal of Dr Oteng-Adjei for decreeing that the GNPC must be the only agency to supply crude oil to the refinery.
They also accused officials of the GNPC and its Board Chairman, Mr Ato Ahwoi, of using their influence with state powers to make the refinery a tolling facility, at the expense of the taxpaye
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