General News of Thursday, 29 June 2017

Source: starrfmonline.com

Contaminated fuel not on the market – NPA assures

Chief Executive of the NPA, Mr Alhassan Tampuli Chief Executive of the NPA, Mr Alhassan Tampuli

The National Petroleum Authority (NPA) has assured the public that the five million liters of contaminated fuel from the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation (BOST) sold to Movenpiina and Zup Oil has not hit the market.

According to the acting Chief Executive of the NPA, Mr Alhassan Tampuli, investigations indicates that, none of the contaminated fuel had hit the market adding that his outfit is still monitoring the situation.

It had earlier been reported by a section of the media that most of the contaminated fuel had already hit some fuel stations and being sold to the public creating fear among motorists.

But the acting CEO of NPA in an interview on Accra FM said “So for now, we want to assure the motoring public that, the fear and anxiety that the product has hit the market is not well consistent with the facts that as we have verified.”

The NPA acting CEO added: “So we want the general motoring public to be assured that there isn’t much to worry about, as it has now, as far as our monitoring is concerned, and our monitoring officers are on the ground, and at the right time if there is any new information that the public needs to know, we will let the public know.”

The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers has already called for the prosecution of officials of BOST over the sale of the contaminated fuel and according to the NPA the companies that acquired the product are not licensed.

BOST had earlier sanctioned the sale of the contaminated fuel out of a number of options after considering that to be economically prudent and according to the Petroleum Chamber, a meeting convened by the NPA demanded that the transaction should be halted and a recall of some 421,000 liters of the fuel which had already been discharged.

Meanwhile, the former Power Minister, Dr. Kwabena Donkor has stated that the continuous stay of the Managing Director of BOST, Alfred Obeng Boateng in office would compromise any investigation carried out by the government.

He is demanding that the BOST MD is interdicted before a government committee set up to probe the brouhaha starts its sittings.