The Board Chairman of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) says he has stopped his attempt to offer PetroSA an equal split in the interest held by GNPC’s subsidiary Jubilee Oil Holdings Ltd.

Freddie Blay said this based on the directive of the Energy Minister, Dr Matthew Opoku-Prempeh. 

“As I talk to you now, I have ceased and I have desisted in accordance and with directives of my supervising minister,” he said in an interview with JoyNews on Saturday, May 26. 

Freddie Blay has also denied any wrongdoing in offering interest in Ghana’s oil fields to a South African oil company. 

The former Deputy Speaker of Parliament and former National Chairman of the New Patriotic Party said he exercised good judgment in the matter and acted in the best interest of the country. 

He thus did not see any reason for demands for his resignation. 

“Possibly, I could be fired, but I don’t see any reason why they are saying I should resign about this issue. I have done nothing wrong. 

“I have observed my conscience and I thought I was protecting the interest of the country, and I am convinced about it and if others think otherwise, and if those who appointed me are saying otherwise, then so be it,” he said in an interview with Citi FM on Tuesday, May 23. 

Already, some 29 Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) have also demanded the removal of the two. 

The CSOs, made up of the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP), Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), the Chamber of Petroleum Consumers Ghana (COPEC) and 26 others, say the two men have “become a threat to Ghana’s interest in the petroleum sector.”

In a statement endorsed by representatives from all 29 CSOs and sighted by JoyNews, the coalition argued that a country being micromanaged by the IMF cannot be seen to be engaging in fiscal recklessness.

The group is also demanding complete information on the AFC transaction and the actual amount that would constitute petroleum cost and the immediate closure of the Aker PoD from the Petroleum Commission and Government.”