TOR, VALCO owe TDC GH¢581.7m in rent after leases expired, MD says
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TDC Ghana says Tema Oil Refinery and VALCO owe a combined GH¢581.7 million in rent plus years of unpaid ground rent, with their leases expired and renewal negotiations yet to produce payment.
Tema Development Company Ghana Limited says the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) and the Volta Aluminium Company (VALCO) owe it a combined GH¢581.7 million in rent, despite the expiry of their property leases, and have also failed to pay ground rent for several years.
TDC Managing Director Courage Makafui Nunekpeku disclosed the arrears during a working visit by the Minister for Works, Housing and Water Resources, Ahmed Ibrahim, to TDC Ghana Ltd. He said the two state-owned enterprises would be required to settle their outstanding obligations, including ground rent, as part of any lease renewal.
"VALCO is an illegal tenant. Their lease has expired. They don’t have any documents for living there. Same applies to TOR. Their lease has expired. Assuming we were a private organisation, we can just go there and evict them from there," Nunekpeku said.
He said the companies "don’t have any right to be on that facility", adding that the amount owed would have to be paid together with ground rent accumulated over several years.
Efforts to negotiate with TOR had yet to yield results, Nunekpeku said, expressing hope that the minister’s intervention would help recover the money. "If you put the two together, we are heading towards a billion. And if we have that money, Hon. Minister, we don’t have to go to any bank to start some of these high-rise structures," he said.
In response, Ibrahim urged TDC management to pursue the outstanding payments and to independently verify the status of TOR’s lease, noting that the refinery is now under private management. "Go and see whether it is true. If it were to be your private property, you think you’d be sitting here pretending not to know. I beg you, verify that and let’s start the discussion," the minister said.