NGO INITIATES PROGRAMME ON OIL AND GAS OWNERHIP (PAGE 22, AUGUST 21, 2010)

THE Centre for Social and Community Advancement (CESCA), a Ghanaian non-profit making development organisation has initiated a programme to help dispel the misconceptions of exclusive ownership of the oil and gas find by the people in the Jomoro District.
The Jubilee Field is located in the sea area of Jomoro in the Nzema area.
The project, being implemented by CESCA and the Kumasi Institute of Technology and Environment (KITE), was organised for stakeholders at Half Assini and Ezinlibo all in the Jomoro District.
It is dubbed: “Facilitating improved stakeholder access to information on Ghana’s emerging petroleum industry”.
The project is also to help the people in the area to understand the manpower needs of the oil industry and which of the needs the people may be qualified for.
Speaking at one of such programmes at Half Assini, the Executive Chairman of CESCA, Mr Ketiboa K. Blay, explained that in developing messages for the project, they were guided by the deep and personal knowledge of the issues on the ground which largely had arisen from initial poor management of disclosure of information from 2007 to 2009.
He said they were also informed by the misconceptions of the people in the Nzema area of the oil and gas industry, the resultant expectations, which if not managed well with information and education, could be a source of negative consequences on the industry.
Mr Blay said oil and gas being minerals the 1992 Constitution gave ownership (including the jubilee oil and gas) to the state in trust of the people of Ghana.
He stated that oil and gas production impacted on some fish resource livelihood, but there were numerous alternative livelihoods identifiable which the people of the Nzema area could take advantage of.
“The oil and gas industry is highly technical. The Nzema area needs to rapidly build absorptive capacity to be effectively employable where there is an opening,” he said.
Mr Blay urged the Nzema people to think about how they could create transparent and accountable mechanisms for administering any benefits that might accrue to them for socio-economic development of the districts.
He conceded that there could be pollution, but the state agencies were being given the capacity to monitor, prevent and abate pollution, adding “Citizens’ vigilance would complement and make state agencies more effective in that endeavour”.
The Jomoro District Chief Executive (DCE), Mr Nyianyi Kablan, urged the people to consider how much the country would earn from the oil and gas industry before thinking about royalties that would accrue to the people in the stakeholder communities.
“We should always be guided by the laws of the country pertaining to the oil and gas production,” he said.
The DCE said the people should be well educated on the laws for them to appreciate issues pertaining to the payment of royalties from the oil find.