Sipa Yankey bows out at Ghana Gas
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana National Gas Company (Ghana Gas), Dr George Sipa-Adjah Yankey, is proceeding on his terminal leave.
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The Board of Directors of Ghana Gas has approved a request by Dr Yankey to proceed on terminal leave, effective February 1, 2017, and terminating in May 2017.
A statement signed by the Corporate Communications Manager of Ghana Gas, Mr Alfred Ogbamey, and issued in Accra said Dr Yankey was leaving behind a legacy of overseeing the conception, birth and growth of Ghana’s premier natural gas processing company.
“He has led the pioneering of Ghana Gas from its incorporation in July 2011 through its successful implementation of Phase I of the Western Corridor Gas Infrastructure Development Project (WCGIDP) to the processing and supply of ‘First Gas’ to the Volta River Authority (VRA), beginning 1:45 p.m. on Monday, November 24, 2014,” it said.
Ghana Gas
It said Dr Yankey supervised the construction and operation phases of Ghana Gas and had served as a board member and CEO of the company since it was dreamt as a concept and the structures established.
More than 300 people have been engaged in direct employment, while the company has provided thousands of ancillary jobs in the service, hotelier, marketing and transport industries, as well as in the delivery and retail of LPG and condensates across Ghana.
The statement said under the leadership of the outgoing CEO, Ghana Gas completed the three-tier Ghana Gas project from conception and design to the construction of a 12-inch 58-kilometre offshore pipeline, a 20-inch 111-kilometre onshore pipeline and the world-class Atuabo Gas Processing Plant (GPP) within a period less than the three-to-four-year standard global timeline for such projects.
It said Dr Yankey oversaw the engineering, design and installation of a second overhead de-ethenizer compressor which would be connected to Ghana Gas facilities in February 2017.
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It said Dr Yankey also led the negotiation of the upgrade of the processing capacity of the Atuabo GPP from 150 million standard cubic feet of gas a day (mmscfd) to 180mmscfd, the construction of the 290-km offshore pipeline from Aboadze to Tema and signed the project implementation agreements (PIAs) for both projects in September 2016.
“Dr Yankey came into the CEO position at Ghana Gas with a background as a finance, trade and investment lawyer. He is a former Minister of Health, former President of the ECOWAS Bank, former Adjunct Professor at the International Law Institute, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, and Visiting Instructor at the Law Development Institute in Rome, Italy.
VRA debt
The statement said the main challenge Dr Yankey was leaving for his successor to tackle was the inability of Ghana Gas’ main downstream off-taker, the VRA, to pay the over US$450 million debt owed the company for lean gas supplied to the Aboadze Thermal enclave to generate electricity.
“A 2016 first half-year report by the Public Interest and Accountability Committee (PIAC), which projected the debt at about $307 million in June last year, noted that the non-servicing of the debt could impact negatively on domestic natural gas production,” it said.