The Minority in Parliament has called for an urgent review of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC)-GENSER agreement to ensure a level playing field for all industry players and transparency in gas pricing.

The call for a thorough review of the agreement, the Minority said, is premised on the following grounds which include the Gas Sales Agreement (GSA) and the Gas Transmission Agreement (GTA), which does not ensure transparency in the pricing of gas.

The others are the shifting of the agreement from Ghana Gas Company and the signing of the agreement by GNPC when Ghana Gas is supposed to be the national gas transmission utility and the discount given to GENSER by GNPC for the gas transmission agreement and GNPC’s inability to explain satisfactorily how this discount will be recovered.

Value for money

A statement issued and signed by the Deputy Minority leader, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, on behalf of his colleagues on the joint committee of Finance and Mines and Energy, pledged to unravel all the flaws in the agreement to guarantee value for money.

“We take this position with a firm conviction that the heart and soul of Ghana’s future lies in our energy security and all the critical issues related to it, including transparent gas pricing,” it said.

Intervention

The Minority commended the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, for his timely intervention to rope in the finance committee to work jointly with the Mines and Energy Committee to deal with these outstanding issues to ensure that the country was not short-changed.

 It said the issues were now appropriately presented before Parliament and demand thorough appraisal.

 The Minority therefore described as unfortunate comments made in the public domain on the report by the Chairman of the Mines and Energy Committee, Samuel Atta Akyea, while a new referral was pending.

“Transparency and accountability should be the guiding principles in this process, especially as any premature public statements can potentially compromise the integrity of the new referral which is in the pipeline,” it stated.

Pledge

The Minority Caucus further requested that the chairman of the Finance and Energy Committees convey a meeting forthwith to consider the Speaker’s referral.

It gave an assurance that they would not compromise the trust reposed in them by the people of Ghana and pledged to uphold the interests of the citizenry, adding that they believed the country must strike the right balance between private enterprise and social benefit. 

“We will work to encourage private sector participation in the oil and gas sector as enacted in Ghana’s local content and participation law which was championed by the government of the National Democratic Congress.”

 “The GNPC-GENSER agreement, as it stands, raises significant concerns that cannot be overlooked,” it added.

SOURCE: GraphicOnline