The Minister of State at the Ministry of Energy, Herbert Krapa, has revealed government’s plan to immediately revive the laboratories of the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) in order to support its revenue generation activities.
He made this announcement when he spoke to journalists yesterday when he paid a working visit to TOR to acquaint himself with the company’s operations in his first official visit since assuming the role recently.
The Minister of State, who was accompanied by senior officials from the Ministry of Energy and the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), regulators of the petroleum downstream sector, met with the Managing Director, Mr. Kofi Mocumbi Tagoe and his management team to receive briefings on the company’s situation and also to discuss government’s perspective, ahead of an extensive tour of its facilities, including laboratories.
He noted during the meeting that the fact of TOR being the first institution within the energy sector that he was visiting spoke volumes about the importance that the President attached to the need for the refinery to work again, and indicated that need for all hands to get on board in this direction.
“TOR is a strategic national asset and urgently needs a strategic partner to get back on its feet”, he noted.
On the refinery’s laboratories, the Minister of State noted that when properly revamped and tooled up, it could provide cutting edge, innovative services that would not improve its reputation but also prove to be a major financial boost to its revenues, and that government was giving this its utmost, urgent attention. Founded on December 12, 1960, as the Ghanaian Italian Petroleum (GHAIP) Company, Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) stands as Ghana’s premier crude oil processing facility.
Originally Italian-owned, the government became the sole shareholder in April 1977, prompting a name change to TOR in 1991.
