WESTERN STEEL CLOSED DOWN AFTER SERIES OF EXPLOSION

THE Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare has ordered the immediate closure of Western Steel and Forgings Limited for a period of one month.

This is to ensure that the managers of the company adhere to health and safety instructions which are statutory requirements for the establishment of factories.

The Minister of Employment and Social Welfare, Mr Enoch Teye Mensah, gave the order when he toured the factory at the Kpone Industrial Area in Tema yesterday.

The minister, accompanied by the acting Factory Inspector, Mr Felix Adjei Boye, met the management of the company, in the presence of the national executive of the Association of Ghana Industries (AGI), the Chief Labour Officer and officials of the Ghana Employers Association (GEA).

The order to the management to close down the factory comes on the heels of four explosions at the factory since February 2011 which have claimed the life of one worker and injured 15 others.

The explosions occurred on February 1, April 21, 22 and 30, 2011. Reports indicated that they were caused by inadequate safety measures and procedures.

Mr Mensah chastised officials of Western Steel for maximising profit without taking adequate measures to ensure the safety of workers.

“It is for this reason that the Labour Unit of the ministry must take up this issue seriously to serve as a test case to others,” he said.

A technical team from the Factories Inspectorate Division of the Ministry of Employment and Social Welfare, led by Mr Boye, had, on Tuesday, visited the premises of Western Steel, after the division had come under fire from the Ghana Federation of Labour (GFL) for its failure to ensure safety measures.

The GFL also petitioned the Ministry of Employment to close down the factory with immediate effect to compel its management to put in proper safety measures.

Mr Mensah said an amended Factory’s Act would be ready by the end of the year which would make provisions for sanctions against recalcitrant factory owners who took employees for a ride.

The three-member management team of the company, made up of Mr Pius Tamakloe, the Managing Director; Sibnath Bhandophaty, the Chief Operation Officer, and Nana Tamakloe, the Corporate Affairs Director, was distraught at the minister’s verdict and would not answer further queries from the media regarding the explosions.

The minister recommended that all cylinders, pressure vessels and leaking equipment be examined properly by a certified engineer.

The Greater Accra Regional Factory Inspector, Mr Ohene Mensah, told the minister that preliminary investigations conducted by the division had revealed that residual oil and other gases that could lead to explosion were not adequately catered for, while employees were equally not properly protected.

“We also observed that there was over-exerted pressure on the furnace, while the gauges of cylinders were not reading accurately,” Mr Mensah said.

According to him, the technical team that inspected the factory further observed that cylinders and pressure vessels were not tested, as required by the law.

The team further observed that house-keeping at the furnace platform was poor, while the furnace itself was not well protected, leaving gas, hot air, fumes and other emissions to interact freely in the working environment.

Mr Mensah said the team also found that the overhead crane operator cage was enclosed, while the absence of bins resulted in scrap metals being deposited haphazardly at the furnace platform.

The President of the AGI, Nana Owusu Afari, called on the ministry to adequately resource the inspectorate division to ensure that proper monitoring mechanisms were adopted as preventable means against the any untoward occurrences.

Source: Della Russel Ocloo, Daily Graphic, May 6, 2011