Thank you, Mr Speaker.
Mr Speaker, if you take what Ghana has achieved so far, since the inception of the production of oil, the total amount that has accrued to the nation amounts to US$3.98 billion. And so, if you take the seven-year period, even discounting the year 2011, it means that we are receiving about US$666 million per annum. That is the total amount we get as a country from all our oil resources.
Mr Speaker, I am saying this because people tend to believe that once we have found oil, it means we get so much revenue. However, when you look at the amount that we actually get and even compare that to the Energy Sector Levy Act (ESLA) and to the Special Petroleum Tax, it is a small figure. So in my opinion we should begin to interrogate what we are actually getting and what we are utilising that for.
Mr Speaker, even with this, 41 per cent of this amount goes to the Annual Budget Funding Amount (ABFA), 31 per cent goes to GNPC for its equity participation and all the other interests; 20 per cent goes to the Ghana Stabilisation Fund; and 8 per cent goes to the Ghana Heritage Fund. So, every year, when we receive an average of about US$666 million, only 41 per cent of that amount is actually meant for expenditure through the Budget.
It is important that we understand some of these issues so that when we put so much expectation on our oil revenues, we tend to misalign our expectations, and it creates a problem.
Mr Speaker, if you look at what we accrued in the year 2017, that was why I was surprised when the Hon Member who spoke previously made the assertion that we did not achieve what we intended to get. We got US$362 million in the year 2017, compared to US$172 million in the year 2016. So it means that for the year 2017, we got more than double the total amount we got in the year 2016.
It tells you that in the year 2017, we got a lot of money compared to the year 2016, because the Jubilee Fields were producing, the Tweneboa Enyenra Ntomme (TEN) Oil Fields were producing and now we have the Sankofa Fields
coming on board. So, yes, volumes are increasing, but even the prices were also increasing. It means that Government got a lot of money.
However, Mr Speaker, my worry is with Ghana Gas Company Limited. As I speak to you, Ghana Gas Company Limited is indebted to a tune of about US$750 million; and the company is virtually collapsing. Indeed, last year, they supplied 2,216,000,000 standard cubic feet of gas, and not even one penny was paid to them last year. If you look at the table, it captures revenues received from petroleum lifting, but nothing is captured on gas sales.
Mr Speaker, while we pass the ESLA to deal with the legacy debt of about US$9.2 billion, we are compounding the debt with what is happening from the year 2017 thereabouts. I believe this House should take a particular interest in this matter. If we continue on this trajectory, we are likely to collapse the system.
Mr Speaker, finally, if you look at page 26, in table 11 of the full document, it tells you how ABFA were spent. A total of US$265 million was allocated. Out of that, we are told that physical infrastructure and service delivery in the education sector was US$202 million. But when you look at the details, not a penny of this money was spent on physical infrastructure. All the moneys went into goods and services.
Mr Speaker, if we have an economy where we spend so much on goods and services, but nothing on physical infrastructure, eventually, we will collapse the economy.
I would wish that in adopting this, we make recommendations to the Ministry in particular to ensure that, if they tell us they are spending money on physical infrastructure, they actually do that and
