Workers of Tema Oil Refinery, TOR, are kicking against plans to build a new refinery next to the current facility.  

The workers say they are shocked at the news since TOR has a development plan towards expanding the current refinery.

Chairman of the General Transport, Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union at TOR, John Elton Botwey said, “…it hit us as news, I mean, nobody has an idea of what the minister really wants to do but I take it that maybe he has misplaced either his notes or technically whoever advised him has not done a yeoman’s job.”

“TOR itself has a development plan that is going to see to its expansion and it’s going to be the 160,000 barrels per day … and apparently, if he says he’s building a new TOR, I don’t know what’s going to happen to the old TOR which means that all the plans that are there are going to be scrapped,” he said. 

Mr Botwey believes the Energy Minister got it wrong, “And that I don’t know how he’s going to do it. Honestly, I didn’t listen to him speak but from the excerpts I have and whatever I’ve been seeing on the media landscape, I feel that he’s got it wrong.”

Energy Minister Boakye Agyarko recently disclosed to JoyBusiness that government is encouraging some private sector firms to build a new refinery next to the Tema Oil Refinery. 

He said the move is part of plans to help Ghana attain energy hub status that the government is aiming at in the short to medium term.

The workers are therefore meeting on Monday to see the way forward, “So the union is trying to meet the management. We are pulling through a meeting by Monday to see what exactly the way forward.”