By Cecil MENSAH
To avert accidents and fire outbreaks in the petroleum downstream sector and ensure safety, the Association of Oil Marketing Companies (AOMCs) launched a week-long campaign to ensure sanity in the sector.
The week-long campaign dubbed, Association’s Safety Week Celebrations (ASWEC), was to push for safety and safeguard properties in the industry.
The petroleum downstream sector has been plagued with massive explosions, which have resulted in innocent persons losing their lives.
The AOMC with the support of Bidi Group, an underground storage tanks cleaning and calibration services company, launched the week-long campaign to educate the public on safety in the sector as part of the measures to ensure safety.
The campaign is expected to educate consumers in the petroleum downstream sector in the wake of the sporadic explosions at the retail points of petroleum products.
The week-long campaign, which was on the theme: ‘’Petroleum Safety, It’s Your Right” took leadership of the AOMCs to the various petrol stations, taxi ranks and lorry stations to educate them on the need to observe safety in the petroleum sector.
Briefing the sector players at the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Kweku Agyemang Duah, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of AOMCs, said the campaign was designed last year but had to be put on hold after some sector assessment.
According to him, the campaign formed part of the measures to reinvigorate safety among members in the industry.
He said the explosions which have plagued the industry in recent times must be put behind.
Even though people died and properties were damaged, what is important is to ensure zero injuries and zero fatalities.
It is in view of this that members of the association got together to design the safety week to educate members of the association as well as members of the general public, he explained.
He said the campaign is to send a signal to the public to inculcate the habit of safety as a way of life.
He was hopeful the campaign will imbibe into customers’ safety as a way of culture in the country.
On his part, Mr Ben Agyare, a representative of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), said ensuring safety in the petroleum downstream has been a challenge for the authority as a result of the explosions that have been happening in recent times.
Launching the campaign, a Deputy Minister Energy, Dr. Mohammed Amin Adams, called on the NPA to engage the services of safety auditors to steer the affairs of Oil Marketing Companies when it comes to safety.
He said this will work to produce standards in the industry and help train pump attendants with the appropriate skills.
He revealed the Ministry in collaboration with the Council of Vocational and Technical Education (COVET) to come out with a competent-based module to train pump attendants with requisite skills to ensure safety in the sector.
Writer’s e-mail: cecilm@businessdayghana.com
