Make TOR functional to reduce excessive fuel price hikes – COPEC tells govt

The Chamber for Petroleum Consumers Ghana (COPEC) says a major option for government to alleviate the continuous price hikes of fuel is to make the Tema Oil Refinery functional.

TOR shut down operations several years ago due to lack of crude oil which serves as the raw material for the refinery.

The refinery, prior to its collapse had the capacity to refine about 45,000 barrels of crude oil a day.

However, some stakeholders in the oil value chain are concerned that the non-operationalization of the refinery is also affecting the price of imported fuel.

Speaking to Citi News, the Executive Secretary for COPEC, Duncan Amoah said it is still unclear the fate of Ghana’s Oil Refinery.

“We are not exactly certain where we are going with our refinery [TOR]. It’s been one talk after the other, one promise after the other. The long and short however is that the refinery continues to be grounded. No activity, nothing is working. In view of the fact that you have some new refineries coming on the stream across the sub-region.

“One would have expected officials or authorities to be minded by the need to protect the technical workforce of our refinery by finding any means necessary to get TOR back to work, unfortunately, it has not been the case,” Duncan Amoah expressed worry.

The National Petroleum Authority (NPA) on April 15 backtracked on its decision to increase the Fuel Marking Margin (FMM) from 4 pesewas to 9 pesewas.

The NPA had earlier directed all Oil Marketing Companies (OMC) to implement the new rates and apply them in their Price Build-Ups (PBUS) from April 16, 2023.

However, in a recent statement, the regulator has withdrawn the increment, stating that the FMM will remain at 4 pesewas per litre until further notice.