Vice President Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has paid a surprise visit to the Tema Port to familiarise himself with the operations of the port and hear at first hand the challenges facing the players in the sector.
The Tema Port is a major backbone of the country’s revenue collection efforts, generating a significant percentage of annual domestic revenue. The Tema Collection Point of the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) however missed its 2016 target, mobilizing GHȼ7,334,174,613.10 against a target of GHȼ7,690.380.000.00. The shortfall was 4.63 percent.
Jacob Kwabla Adorkor, Director of Ports, and officials of the Customs Division including sector commander, Confidence Nyadzi conducted Dr Bawumia round to observe the operations of the Nick TC Scan, Meridian Port Services (MPS), Golden Jubilee Car park, State Warehouse, and Atlas Copco, among others.
The Vice President also interacted with Clearing Agents, workers at the Port, security and other officers, and ordinary Ghanaians anxious to clear their goods on time.
He inspected seized goods stored in the State warehouse, including mattresses, fridges and other materials barred from importation.
In brief comments after the tour, Vice President Bawumia, indicated that the Akufo-Addo government would take steps to consolidate some of the functions at the port that interface with the public in order to reduce the frustrations of Agents and port users, while plugging any revenue leakages.
This is the second time Vice President Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has paid an unannounced visit to a key government facility in as many weeks. On January 18, 2017, Dr Bawumia visited the Registrar General’s Department to identify the bottlenecks bedeviling the State outfit and also interacted with owners of businesses and ordinary Ghanaians who had gone to the Department to register their businesses.
