Govt will keep eye on oil production

Spread (lead) Feb 28/2008

Story: Charles Benoni Okine

THE government has given the assurance that it will keep “an eagle’s eye” on Ghana’s oil when production begins in the country to ensure that the country benefits fully from the find.
It has also promised to fashion out pragmatic and prudent policies to ensure equity in the use of proceeds from the oil production.
The Chief Advisor to the President, Mrs Mary Chinery-Hesse, gave the assurances when she drew the curtain on the first-ever National Oil and Gas Forum in Accra on Tuesday night.
Her comments followed assurances by the management of Kosmos Energy that the first draw of the country’s ‘black gold’ would happen in the middle of next year following intensive exploration activities in the company’s area of operation.
Mrs Chinery-Hesse said after listening to the various suggestions, experiences and contributions from participants from different backgrounds at the forum, the government was poised to ensure transparency and accountability in all its dealings with regard to all manner of negotiations with foreign and local companies and award of contracts to the satisfaction of all.
She said the government was still open to frank ideas and realistic suggestions from Ghanaians as to how the country’s new treasure should be managed to make it a blessing and not a curse.
The two-day forum, attended by experts in many areas of oil exploration, was organised along four major themes: “Turning Oil and Gas Wealth into Sustainable and Equitable Development”, “Entrenching Transparency and Stakeholder Engagement”, “Effective Management of the Oil and Gas Sector” and “Safeguarding Security and the Environment”.
“We have known from this forum that we have Ghanaian experts all over the world in the area of oil exploration, management and use and we will develop a database on all of them,” she said.
Mrs Chinery-Hesse said evolving policies and programmes and the management of the oil should be the Ghanaian way, based on lessons from those countries that already had the resource.
“We are not going to act slavishly with what we do with the oil. It is ours and we will make sure that we derive the maximum benefit from it,” the Presidential Chief Advisor said.
She, however, cautioned that in all the dealings, “we should also bear in mind that in whatever we do with this find, we do not forget the future generations,” Mrs Chinery-Hesse added.
She said the find should not be a recipe for social anarchy and degradation but one that would benefit the present and future generations and called on Parliament to be the watchdog over the oil by ensuring that bills on its management and use were discussed dispassionately and non politically before they were passed in the supreme interest of the state.
The Chief Executive of the Ghana National Chamber of Mines, Ms Joyce Aryee, for her part, cautioned against the mistakes that had denied the country its due from other mineral resources.
Her caution came in the wake of worries expressed by some of the participants to the effect that Ghana had not benefited from its large deposits of gold and other minerals.
They argued that in many of the areas where gold, one of the most expensive and revered minerals in the world, was mined, the people had been left in abject poverty, while their land which they relied on for farming had been degraded.
Ms Aryee said the oil should be a turning point in the life of the country, saying that as the mistakes in the use and management of those resources are corrected, “we are sure to derive the maximum benefits”.
She said the oil should also open up the economy to create more employment opportunities for the people, adding that it should also lead to massive infrastructural development in the road and rail sectors, while the telecommunication and salt industries will also benefit.
Speaking on maritime challenges to the oil and gas discovery, Mr Kofi Mbeah, the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Shippers’ Council, said four critical things, namely, construction, drilling, storage and transportation of the product, involved in the exploitation of oil and gas raised issues for the maritime sector.
He said what was key was how to manage the ‘sea use conflict’ that arose with respect to the exploitation of the living resources of the area, navigation and over flight, marine scientific research, the laying of submarine cables in the midst of all the other activities related to the exploitation activities
Mr Mbeah called for the deployment of modern Information Technology-based security systems to be able to secure the entire area where the production was expected to take place.
He also called for maintenance and repair facilities at the ports for oil rigs and vessels carrying oil and gas, since one could anticipate a high number of tankers, which would mean a high number of breakdowns and repairs.
The Ga Mantse, King Tackie Tawiah III, for his part, called for a strong political will to ensure that the oil and gas to be produced in the country would further enhance the development of the country.
He said it was also crucial for the government to ensure that the area of production was well secured to prevent suspicious characters from interfering in the affairs of the companies to be allocated blocks within the Cape Three Points area.