Govt To Take Over Tema Shipyard

The Government is to take over the PSC Tema Shipyard Limited from its Malaysian management team as part of measures instituted to salvage the fortunes of the company.

The Minister of Ports, Harbours and Railways, Professor Christopher Ameyaw-Akumfi, who announced this in Accra yesterday when he took his turn at the meet-the-press series, said the measure had become all the more prominent as a result of the lack of investment injection ever since the Malaysians took over the company.

The announcement came barely a year after workers of PSC Tema Shipyard petitioned the government to intervene to save the company from total collapse.

In what looked like a direct response to the workers’ call, Prof Ameyaw-Akumfi stated that the government could not sit by while an infrastructure built out of the ordinary person’s tax was mismanaged.

He said to give meaning to government’s decision, the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority had been charged with the responsibility of engaging a consultant to undertake feasibility studies on how to revamp the facility.

The minister pointed out that the previous government, in 1996, gave the 40 per cent share to the Malaysians for $4.2 million.

“Less than half of that amount was paid at that time ever since then nothing had come to the government again,” he said.

This, the minister described as unacceptable, saying the trend would have to be reversed and the government was determined to put things right.

It would be recalled that the local workers union of PSC, last year, petitioned the government to intervene in the affairs of the company, alleging, among others, that the present management was not taking steps to make the company attract business.

The workers also alleged in their petition that management unilaterally cancelled contracts previously signed with shipowners for refurbishment, adding that in cases where ships came for renovation, they were refused access to the facility.