‘Contractor must fund recovery of pontoon’
A former acting Managing Director of the Volta Lake Transport Company (VLTC), Mr Martin Hiles, has stated that the contractor whose action led to the sinking of the MV 4th Republic pontoon at the Volta Lake Port five years ago must fund the recovery .
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A government appointed committee of enquiry into the incident at the time also recommended that the contractor must be made to pay for the full recovery of the pontoon.
The contractor, Messrs Hansa Maritime, a German Maritime and Industrial Spare Parts company, was paid almost 330,000 euros for the rehabilitation of the pontoon which sank at the Akosombo Port in August 2009.
Hansa Maritime, soon after the incident, attempted salvaging it without success.
Insurance
Mr Hiles said Hans Maritime should have had insurance covering the work for the duration that it was to be under their care and should, therefore, not blame the incident on an “act of God”.
In an interview following a Daily Graphic publication that the contractor had attributed the sinking of the ferry to an “act of God,” Mr Hiles said it was the responsibility of the contractor to salvage the ferry and not the MOFA because the contractors should have been covered by a professional indemnity.
Potential danger
He said the continuous stay of the ferry under the water posed a danger and a hazard to shipping, “because when the VLTC boats are moving away from the docking station, they don’t have a clear and safe run.”
Viability of MV 4th Republic
Touching on the viability of salvaging and repairing MV 4th Republic, Mr Hiles said at the moment, it would not be economically wise to pump so much money into refurbishing it after it had been under water for five years, saying, “I doubt if she is worth refurbishing.”
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“The price of 1.2 million euros you quoted in your article for salvage and refurbish plus 1.8 million euros can buy a new ferry for three million euros, which will then last for the next 50 years. So, is it really worth recovering and spending a lot of money on this vessel?” he queried.
New pontoon
He proposed that the money paid to the contractors could be recovered and used as a deposit for a new one.
He expressed the conviction that the Dutch Government might support by providing some of the balance with the government of Ghana contributing something, if a competent and experienced Dutch shipbuilder was commissioned for the replacement.
He said the ferry had been submerged completely and during his two-year stay in VTLC, he never saw it due to the high water levels at the time, explaining that he knew it was there and he had a survey carried out for the recovery by a Ghanaian company which went down and took photographs.
“They could not take many photographs because the visibility was low due to the turbidity of natural phenomena in the lake,” he explained.
Effort by VLTC
Asked what he did as the then MD of the VLTC, he said in 2011, VLTC formally wrote letters to the Ministry of Transport and the then Minister of Food and Agriculture and in 2012, he had a one-on-one meeting with the then Vice President, now President John Dramani Mahama, to discuss a replacement of the ferry for the Kpando/Agordeke crossing.
He disclosed that as a result of those letters and the audience with the Vice President, “there was a meeting to which VLTC was invited. The Ministry of Transport, MOFA, the Africa Development Bank, Ministry of Finance, Hansa Maritime and representatives of all the bodies on the committee which wrote the report were also there”.
Asked about the outcome of that meeting, he said he could not tell what decision was arrived at. “VLTC never heard anything of that meeting since 2011.”
Mr Hiles said the committee of enquiry clearly found that the contractor ignored all advice and recommendations from VLTC and VRA against floating the ferry without covering the holes created as a result of the removal of the drive mechanisms.
Writer’s email: severious.dery@graphic.com.gh