The Ghana Ports and Harbours Authoirty (GPHA) announced that a $50,000 fined is imposed on the Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) for polluting the Tema Port environment with heavy fuel oil discharged from MSC Alexa on May 10, 2016.
The Director of Port at the GPHA, Mr Jacob Kobla Adorkor, told the Daily Graphic in Tema that the GPHA could have constrained the spill to a small area if the terminal operators and the agents for the vessel had reported the incident to the GPHA.
“We have an oil spill contingency plan in place and we would have responded immediately to minimise the effect of the spill if we had prior notice”, Mr Adorkor said.
He said the massive nature of the spill was only known after an investigation was conducted following the report received from the security patrol team.
The vessel was said to be ballasting when the spillage occurred. It is believed that the spill, apart from polluting the area, has also environmental implications on the ecology of the harbour basin.
