Ato Ampiah – TOR MD
Ato Ampiah, Acting Managing Director of Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) yesterday clash with Dr. Maureen of Diamond Shipping Company over the $48 million crude oil transaction in 2010 which has been alleged as a scam.
Mr. Ampiah admitted that his outfit does not owe the two firms, Diamond Shipping Company and Zikokem Nigeria, accusing them of peddling falsehood to destroy his hard-earned reputation.
However Dr. Maureen fired back at the TOR MD, maintaining that her outfit actually supplied the fuel to the oil refinery.
Dr. Maureen noted that she held discussions with Mr. Ampiah over the supply of crude oil, adding that she will seek legal advice from her lawyers.
In an interview with Joy News, Dr Maureen, who was quite incensed, said her outfit has not received the $48 million due it for some 600,000 barrels of oil it supplied to TOR in August 2010.
A certain Ofodeme Sylvester of Zikokem Nigeria, a company that claims to originally own the crude oil given to the shipping vessel told Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, host of Joy FM’s Super Morning Show yesterday that TOR wrongly paid another company Refinee Petroplus for the cargo.
“If you have paid money to somebody and other people come in to make a claim, what you need to do is to call those people you paid this money…and say please we have paid you this money and this company is saying that they supplied the product for which you were paid the money,” he explained.
“This matter is not a difficult one, if you have paid wrongful, call them and asked them to pay.”
The Bureau of National Investigation (BNI) is currently investigating the deal, and Mr Sylvester said they are waiting for the outcome of the investigations into the matter.
Meanwhile, members of the Coalition of Democratic Forces (CDF) have reiterated their call on government to immediately arrest and prosecute management and board of TOR.
According to them, they have followed the cartel with keen interest and believe something suspicious took place.
“Mr Ato Ampiah and some of his management team who shared the money should be removed and prosecuted. We also call on the president to owe out the men in his office who are involved and bring them to book to show the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and the international community that Ghana will not condone corruption”, Michael Omari Wardie, who issued the statement on their behalf said.
The CDF stated that in the course of its work it established that the actual company that was paid the $48 million did not exist, but the move was clandestinely orchestrated by the board members of TOR and some management to pocket the money.
By Charles Nixon Yeboah
