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Opinions of Wednesday, 4 November 2009

Columnist: Daily Post

K.K Sarpong lies

K.K.SARPONG LIES THROUGH HIS TEETH

The immediate ex-Managing Director of the Tema Oil Refinery, TOR, Dr. K.K Sarpong, told a horrendous lie on Peace FM, an Accra radio station last Thursday when he broke his loud and long silence to defend himself against allegations leveled against him by some newspapers including the Daily Post as well as Hon Alfred Agbesi, MP for Ashaiman.

THE LIE? : that there was nothing like Through-Put-Fee account under his administration which yielded millions of dollars but vanished overnight under his watch.

Daily Post, soon after the investigations, decided to dig further and managed to re-establish the fact that the Through-Put-Fee account was really in place under him. It was the total of the SERVICE FEE and the STORAGE RACK FEE.

These fees, under K.K Sarpong, were collected by TOR from any company that imported finished oil products into the country and is paid directly into TOR’s accounts.

Daily Post has spotted the two fees calculated by the K.K Sarpong's Administration for some Oil Marketing Companies who imported finished petroleum products into the country a couple of years ago.

In his interview on Thursday with pro-NPP presenter, Kwame Sefa Kayi, Dr. K.K Sarpong poured scorn on the MP for Ashaiman, Hon. Alfred Agbesi, and inadvertently insulted the people of Ashaiman when he said he wonders if Hon. Agbesi did his law course at the Ashaiman Law School. For the records, Ashaiman has no law school.

Dr. K.K Sarpong, at one point, said the woes of TOR today should not be blamed on him but on the worldwide financial melt-down that rocked the world in 2008.

At another juncture, he laid the blame at the feet of the National Petroleum Authority, NPA, as well as the NPP government because they never paid subsidies money due TOR to it. He asked why he should be blamed when he had to be servicing debts at a time the refinery was making losses.

Dr. K.K Sarpong further claimed that he was a financial guru and had wanted to take up appointment as a lecturer but the media bashing has made this impossible for him.

As noted earlier, Dr. K.K Sarpong collected millions of dollars as SERVICE FEE and STORAGE & LOADING RACK FEE. The million dollar question is where all those monies went to.

Secondly, can Dr. K.K Sarpong deny the fact that he caused some of the OMCs to pay to him personally money owned to TOR by the OMCs?

Thirdly, can Dr. K.K Sarpong tell the whole world why he told the transitional committee that $437million cannot be accounted for because it went into subsidizing fuel even throughout his administration, he never told Ghanaians that fuel cost was being subsidized?

Fourthly, can K.K Sarpong deny the fact that though the Board of TOR awarded the Chinese National Electrical Corporation the contract to provide the refinery with the cooling tower and Generator 5, he went behind the board, took the part of the contract which demanded that the Chinese provide generator 5 away from them and gave it to John Edwards?

Meanwhile, many of the workers of the refinery have called on the Acting Managing Director to transfer one Enoch Sarfo-Mensah from the Credit Control Department of TOR to another and investigate his activities since he contributed in no small way to the current mess at TOR

Stay tuned for more.