IMANI President Franklin Cudjoe is advocating for the privatization of the Bulk Oil Storage and Transportation Company Limited, BOST.
[contextly_sidebar id=”1sYU5Ebf556e50Ae2NATSWp3nR8yI4Ym”]The change of ownership, he argues, will ensure better management systems and efficiency in the running of the company.
The call follows recent agitations from some workers of the company and the chamber of Bulk Oil Distributors, BDCs, over what they describe as bad management practices after the leakage of an audit report which implicated the two for maladministration.
However a press statement issued by the BDCs said the report was “completely false.”
It said attempts “by perpetrators of the story to blend voice recordings of evidence given in camera at sittings by a committee set up by the Energy Ministry, to look into complaints by BDCs against some BOST officials, held 3 years ago, with an unrelated stock reconciliation audit is most disingenuous and unfortunate.”
The statement categorically emphasized that there has been “no fraud” in its dealings with BOST and “neither has the industry connived with any officials to loot the coffers of the state.”
The Managing Director of the Bulk Oil Storage & Transportation Company Limited (BOST) has denied leaking an audit report indicting the Chamber of Bulk Oil Distributors (BDCs) for bribery and corruption.
“I did not! I did not!” he said, adding that “I have signed an oath of secrecy and I take my oaths very seriously.” He explained that he has been privy to the information on that tape from 2013 when he was appointed the MD of BOST and since the issues on that tape were so sensitive, “I made it very clear last year in April when the BDCs wanted to operate the BOST facilities that they were not fit to do so because of some the comments I had heard on that tape.”
Speaking on the Citi Fm’s News analysis programme, The Big Issue, Franklin Cudjoe says the state is not competent enough to operate the company.
“This is a state entity that has never returned any profit. It doesn’t even know how much its debtors owe it. In fact I don’t understand why BOST exist. If indeed we want to have strategic reserves I don’t think it is a state entity that should run it. The fact of the matter is we are supposed to be running a liberalized regime. I think BOST itself has to be clearly looked at again,” he stated.
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By: Franklin Badu Jnr/citifmonline.com