The fight against corruption calls for constant vigilance on the part of all duty bearers if the social and economic canker is to be at least minimised to tolerable levels if not completely rooted out from the Ghanaian society. It has been said times without number that the underdevelopment confronting many African countries is attributable to corruption in high places. Thus any move or attempt to ensure transparency in any state's undertaking is most welcomed.

It is against this background that Public Agenda wholly agrees to the call by the Civil Society Platform on oil and Gas (CSPOG) that Dr George Sipa Yankey, the Chief Executive Officer of Ghana National Gas Company (GNGC), must resign his position over alleged fraud in respect of the construction of a gas processing plant in the Western Region and pave way for investigations into the matter to take place.

The CSPOG insists their call for Dr Yankey to step aside is hinged on alleged huge costs being recorded relative to the gas project and their ramifications for gas pricing when the project is completed, stressing that the president must gather the political courage to deal with those that may be found culpable of any impropriety at Ghana Gas.

It would be recalled that Public Agenda, in its September 17 and 24 editions, reported that China's Sinopec International Petroleum Services Corporation (SIPSC), which is involved in the construction of the gas pipeline in issue, could succeed in short-changing Ghana by at least $140 million which had arisen from alleged transfer pricing manipulation and supply of a supposedly inferior quality gas plant to Ghana.

The gas pipelines being laid by Sinopec in shallow waters are also estimated to have a $1.6 million per kilometre extra cost compared to pipelines of the same width which were laid in deep sea by the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation.

Subsequently, Dr Yankey denied the claims, suggesting that the reports were made out of ?ignorance? or mischief. He contended that he had rather saved Ghana over 200 million U.S. dollars during contract negotiations.

The CSPOG argues that Dr Yankey appears too powerful in the wake of the claims, and he allegedly snubbed the Petroleum Commission and the Ministry of Energy which had made attempts to obtain details of the transactions between GNGC and China?s Sinopec International Petroleum Services Corporation (SIPSC). Dr Yankey is also alleged to have insisted that he reports to the President and not the Commission or the Ministry.

The CSPOG also raised concern about the competitiveness of Ghana gas price: Ghana's projected price of delivered gas to Takoradi (the sum of well head price of gas and capacity charge based on rate of returns) is put at $5.9 per MBtu according to a study by the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP) assuming a zero capital cost of Jubilee field development.

In the midst of all these allegations and their corresponding rebuttals, Public Agenda concurs with the CSPOG that the President must cause a forensic audit of the GNGC so that the truth or otherwise of the allegations will be laid before all Ghanaians. Since his assumption, the President has declared publicly that he will tackle corruption frontally. He has also expressed his commitment to the tenets of transparency, openness and accountability.

Public Agenda believes this is a golden opportunity for the President to prove that he is a person who believes in walking the talk. Investigation into the activities of the GNGC will be the acid test, and he should not allow this chance to slip by.