APA – Accra (Ghana)
The report that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has turned on the valve at the offshore Jubilee Field to signify the production of additional oil from a new well, the Jubilee South East (JSE) Project is one of the leading stories in the Ghanaian press on Monday.
The Graphic reports that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has turned on the valve at the offshore Jubilee Field to signify the production of additional oil from a new well, the Jubilee South East (JSE) Project.
This successful project adds about 30,000 barrels of light sweet crude oil per day (bopd) to what is being produced from the country’s premier oilfield, the Jubilee Field, which lies offshore Cape Three Points in the Western Region.
Production from the field started dwindling from a peak of 120,000bopd in December 2010 to about 70,000bopd.
The additional oil has been made possible through the $4 billion Value Maximisation Plan put in place by the lead operators of the Jubilee Field, Tullow Ghana and its partners, to develop new projects over 10 years.
The partners have invested $1 billion in the JSE Project in three years to drill wells and install subsea infrastructure needed to bring previously undeveloped reserves to production.
The consistent investment saw the successful JSE project, which added more than 30,000 barrels with the current production to 106,000bopd.
The project has advanced the use of Ghanaian suppliers and companies in-country who are fabricating the majority of the complex offshore infrastructure, with more than 90 per cent homegrown workforce.
The newspaper says that the government has increased the price at which it buys a bag of cocoa from GH¢800 per 64 kilogramme (kg) bag to GH¢1,308.
The 63.5 per cent increment also translates to GH¢20,943 per tonne of raw cocoa beans, up from GH¢12,800 per tonne.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who announced the new price at a durbar of chiefs and cocoa farmers at Tepa in the Ashanti Region at the weekend, said the new price “is the highest to be paid to cocoa farmers across West Africa in over 50 years”.
The President said the government decided to open the cocoa season in September instead of the usual October.
“We know the farmers will be sending their wards to school at this time, it is prudent to sell cocoa to meet such expenditures than to borrow at higher interest rates, when the cocoa is readily available,” President Akufo-Addo explained.
The announcement last Saturday effectively ushers in the 2023-2024 cocoa season.
The new price was met with spontaneous applause and shouts of joy by cocoa farmers who were at the durbar.
Out of excitement, they tried to mount the President’s podium in appreciation of the new price.
The Ghanaian Times reports that President, Nana Addo Dank¬wa Akufo-Addo, on Saturday com¬missioned six new vessels into the Ghana Navy Fleet at the Western Naval Command (WNC), Sekondi in the Western Region.
The event was part of the government’s commitment to resource Ghana Navy to effective¬ly secure the country’s maritime domain.
The vessels were two Bound¬ary Class ships, donated by the United States (US) government and christened the Ghana Navy Ship (GNS) Half Assini and GNS Aflao, two Defender Class boats, an Oil Spill Response Vessel, christened Esther Afua Ocloo, for the Ghana Maritime Author¬ity, and a locally-manufactured landing craft.
Speaking at a ceremony, Presi¬dent Akufo-Addo said the move was a manifestation of the gov¬ernment’s commitment to retool and re-equip the Ghana Armed Forces to enable them to perform their duties of protecting the terri¬torial integrity of the country.
Additionally, he indicated that, the new vessels symbolised the government’s resolve to safeguard Ghana’s maritime sovereignty.
The President expressed the government’s commitment to resourcing the Navy and other relevant agencies in the maritime sector to help guarantee the sus¬tainable exploitation and benefits the ocean offered.
“This is a significant achieve¬ment considering that the country experienced several attacks on ships including the kidnapping of nine crew members from a Gha¬naian vessel in 2021,” he said.
President Akufo-Addo urged the Naval officers to continue to safeguard the maritime boundaries from any external aggressions, stressing “As we protect these maritime territories there is the need to maintain significant Naval presence so as to prevent crimi¬nals from exploiting any contested area.”
The US Ambassador to Ghana, Ms Virginia Palmer, explained that the donation of the boats was the latest in the United States’ long¬standing support for the Ghana Navy, including training, technical assistance, and naval infrastructure projects.
She said that the vessels would help to deny pirates, traffickers, and other criminals the use of the sea for their illegal activities, mak¬ing Ghana and the region not just safer, but more prosperous.
The newspaper says that four people were confirmed dead, some injured and others missing after explosion rocked a quarry site at Shama, in the Western Region, in the early hours of Sunday morning.
The Ghanaian Times gathered that both Ghanaians and Chinese were part of the night shift, who were burnt beyond recognition at the G-Omini Quarry site at Anto Aboso, in the Shama District of the Western Region, at about 12:30 am
Explosives, reportedly being kept at an unstructured storage without permit, detonated killing the workers and injuring others while others got missing.
The District Chief Executive for Shama, Ebenezer Dadzie, who confirmed the incident, said efforts were underway to rescue those missing.
He said the District Security Council was yet “to put a number” to the injured and fatalities.
The DCE described the explo¬sion at Omini Quarry as pathetic and terrible considering death and destruction caused.
He told UTV television station that the incident was terrible, when the District Security Council visited the scene, to account for the losses and deploy measures to rescue persons missing at the site.
Mr Dadzie said that the area has been declared a security zone in view of the fact that “human parts have scattered all over the place.”
He advised residents of the di¬saster area to listen to the caution by security personnel to avoid the place.
The Western Regional Direc¬tor of Environmental Protec¬tion Agency (EPA), Mr George Diawuo said the Agency has begun investigations into the disaster, and expressed worry that people thronged the disaster area which was still precarious.
GIK/APA