STATEMENT OF THE MINORITY IN PARLIAMENT ON THE STRANDED ENI GAS MESS CAUSED BY NANA ADDO/BAWUMIA GOVERNMENT.
Ladies and Gentlemen of the media,
The Minority in parliament is shocked at the Nana Addo/Bawumia Government attempts to once again blame the erstwhile NDC Government in their response to the publication captioned: Ghana Bleeds from oil contract, pays $40m monthly for No show. (source: graphic.com).
In that release, the Nana Addo/Bawumia Government Blamed the NDC for the lack of infrastructure to transport gas from the ENI field to the east (Tema) as well as the gas price among others.
Ladies and Gentlemen of the media,
The Minority is keenly aware of the desperate situation this government is in; be it education, health, the economy, road, agriculture and the energy sectors. This Government is drowning in failure and is in a desperate effort to taint the NDC in order to survive.
Gas Infrastructure:
Ladies and Gentlemen of the media,
In an effort to address Ghana’s debilitating energy crisis and to deal with the issue of fuel security for our thermal plants, the Mahama led Government negotiated the biggest gas to power agreement with support of the world bank to ensure that this project is completed on time in order to increase our domestic production of gas to 300mmscf/day.
After the completion of the Atuabo gas project, the next effort was the historic ENI’S OCTP project to utilize the non-associated sankofa gas.
This project represents a game-changer in the country’s gas-to-power ambitions with about 45,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) and 180 mmscf of Gas per day, enough to generate 1000 MW of power daily.
The task then was to ensure that power plants were in place and ready to receive the ENI Gas.
It is important to note that before the NDC left office former President Mahama had initiated processes to interconnect the Ghana National Gas Transmission System (NGTS) with the West African Gas Pipeline System. This is to allow a reverse flow of gas from the West (Takoradi) to the East (Tema) to serve power plants in the Tema enclave. This initiative had received cabinet approval. This was so critical to ensure that the ENI Gas was not stranded. Indeed in 2016 Parliament of Ghana approved an amount of $3m to speed up the process. It is therefore surprising that the Nana Addo/Bawunia government after being in power for 2 long years still want to blame the NDC for the mess they have found themselves in due to the lack of infrastructure to transport gas to the east (Tema).
Ladies and Gentlemen,
In order to ensure maximum use of the ENI gas in the weastern enclave (Takoradi), the NDC Government had planned to move the 450MW KarPowership to Takoradi and not to Tema as done by the Nana Addo/Bawumia Government. Even after bringing it to Tema the process of getting the KarPowership to Takoradi to utilize the ENI gas has been intentionally delayed and instead this government has only been interested in changing fuel suppliers with karpower and fruitless renegotiations.
Gas Price:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is strange that the Nana Addo/Bawumia Government is still ranting of gas price reduction from $9.8mmBtu to $7,89mmBtu when in actual fact the gas price is supposed to have been $6,5mmBtu.
It is important for Ghanaians to know that the indicative gas price of $9.8mmbtu is linked to cost savings arising from the development cost of the project of $7billion ( that is for every $100m cost savings made the gas price will reduced by US Cents 55.) It was not therefore surprising when the Committee of Mines and Energy declined Ghana National Petroleum corporation (GNPC) request to allow the partners to use the cost savings of $691m to drill extra wells as well as increase gas production from 180mmscf/day to 250mmscf/day.
The committee recommended that the said amount should be applied in line with the gas sales agreement; that is reducing the gas price by $3.3mmbtu (i.e 0.55 X 6).
The report of the committee (on the 2018 annual program of activities ) as recommended was subsequently approved by Parliament in March 2018 .
The Minority therefore demand from the Government the whereabouts of the $691m cost savings.
Ladies and gentlemen,
In conclusion, the Minority want Ghanaians to know that it is Nana Addo/Bawumia Government’s incompetence and lack of planning that has plunged us into this mess. The government must therefore accept full responsibility for the monthly debt mess we are in and stop blaming the erstwhile NDC government.
…signed…
Hon, Adam Mutawakilu (MP)
Ranking Member,
Mines and Energy