…Tankers loaded with oil go unnoticed

By Livingstone Pay Charlie

This is one of the well-orchestrated thieveries at the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR). Exclusive intelligence available to Daily Post indicates that tankers loaded with oil are allowed to go free without paying any money for their consignment. This is because some unscrupulous officials of the refinery claim the tankers are loaded with ordinary water.

The modus operandi of the thieving clique at TOR is that since the tankers are loaded with so-called ‘water’, they are to return to the loading bay the next day for re-loading of real oil.

Daily Postsources say the thieving officers get away with their crime because they have shifted the loading time to very late hours, filling the tankers sometimes at about 11:00pm. This is more so because the refinery currently does not have any well-structured security set up.

Though it has never been the norm for tankers to be loaded at 11:00pm, the saboteurs at TOR insist on doing so at that time, disregarding the earlier practice that by 7:00pm, loading should seize.

The saboteurs have even gone to the extent of rejecting moves to bring in operatives to police the top echelons of TOR’s security set-up.

Three weeks ago, when the criminal acts were reported, the thieving officers were loud in their claim that it is impossible for such thievery to occur at the refinery.

Usually reliable sources told this reporter it is not possible for tankers at TOR to be loaded with ordinary water.

After crude is refined, real oil is kept at the Storage Tank. “The contents of the Storage Tank are then moved to the Delivery Tank which has two outlets; one for water to gush out and the other for real oil to be withdrawn,” our source at TOR explained.

After water is allowed to gush out into the Waste Tank, it is now the job for Laboratory Technicians to take specimen from the Delivery Tank for testing whether it still contains water or not.

When the technicians give the go-ahead that what is in the Delivery Tank is pure refined oil, the contents are then pumped into another container called the Marketing Tank from where the tankers can be loaded.

“So it is a blatant lie that tankers are loaded with water at TOR. That is not possible. It is only when the Laboratory technicians are convinced that tankers are loaded with oil that is when tankers can be loaded,” the source added. Signals picked up by Daily Post suggest that a cabal of NPP elements is behind this clear thievery. From management to worker level, TOR is occupied by 85 percent NPP sympathizers who have sworn heaven and earth to thwart the Better Ghana Agenda.

Though the NDC is in government, it has failed to do a massive restructuring at TOR, making the NPP saboteurs to sing the usual refrain, “You are in government, but we are in control”.

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