By Godwill Arthur-Mensah
Accra, Aug. 16, GNA – Mr John Boadu, the Director-General of Social Interests and Governance Authority (SIGA) says no oil refinery in the world can break even or make profit if the refinery cannot produce at least 100, 000 barrels of oil per day.
Mr Boadu made the remarks in response to a question concerning the Tema Oil Refinery’s (TOR) quagmire (inactiveness) in recent years. That was during the Minister’s press briefing organised by the Ministry of Information in Accra on Thursday.
The current daily production capacity of Tema Oil Refinery is 45,000 barrels per day.
Mr Boadu explained that TOR was originally not set up to make profit but to meet the petroleum needs of the nation.
Therefore, he said, during the refinery’s formative years, anytime there was hikes in oil prices on the international market government used TOR’s products to subsidize petroleum products locally.
Over the years, the refinery accumulated huge debts while its machines run to a halt or became obsolete.
Mr Boadu noted that political actors over the years, had not helped TOR to return to its glory days and believed that getting a strategic investor to inject funds into the refinery would breathe fresh air into its operations.
Touching on State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), he stated that hitherto there wasn’t much transparency and accountability among SOEs because of the absence of an institution or body with an oversight responsibility over them.
“In 2016, only two SOEs presented their audited accounts report out of 175, and so, if there is no SIGA to enforce compliance, I believe most SOEs wouldn’t present their audited reports.
“At the moment, 55 SOEs have presented their audited accounts and by the close of the year 130 would have presented their audited accounts,” Mr Boadu noted.
In terms of the contributions of the SOEs to the economy, Mr Boadu said in 2020 the SOEs contributed about GHc20 billion to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and increased to GHc419 billion in 2022.
That, he said, was as a result of the SIGA’s push for compliance, transparency and accountability among SOEs to present audited accounts.
On irregularities by some SOEs, the D-G of SIGA said in 2022 alone the Auditor-General’s Report showed GHc15 billion losses by SOEs, however, the figure had declined to GHc8.8 billion, representing 41.46 per cent reduction of irregularities.
GNA