Evicted Ghanaian housemate of the Big Brother
Africa (BBA) Reality Show, Selorm Galley popular known as Selly has
openly confessed her unflinching love for her boyfriend ‘Praye Tiatia’.
“I
love Big J (Praye Tiatia) and we are not breaking up - we are even
stronger together and I want to take this opportunity to say I thank him
a lot for being my tower of strength - even before I return from South
Africa people told him to dump me but he has been so supportive,” Selly
said.
This is contrary to recent media report, which quoted her
as saying she loved BBA housemate Nando and wished he would win the
show.
There has been a gargantuan controversy around Selly and
Nando following the latter’s confession that he and Selly had an affair
in the house and Selly had infected him with a sexually transmitted
disease (STD).
Selly told Adom News she never had sex with Nando
and that both of them were tested and no such disease was found on her,
so she suspects Nandon might have picked up the infection from a toilet
seat.
“I have no STDs and I have a medical report to prove that” she stated emphatically.
She
admitted to making out with Nando in the house, but denied there was
penetration, adding that the controversy has strengthened her
relationship with boyfriend Praye Tiatia aka ‘Big J’.
“Big J is
the best guy I have ever known in my life because in the midst of all
these confusion he was my strength. My friends in South Africa thought I
was going to be crucified when I return to Ghana but Big J encouraged
me to return and clear the air,” she said with pride.
Selly said
she was very surprised at the media report linking her to Nando as
lovers, and quoting her as saying she wants Nanado to win.
She said she actually wishes either Melvin or Elikem won the show and not Nando.
“I
wonder why the media in my own country are so judgmental while their
colleagues in South Africa have been so supportive of me,” she asked.
Meanwhile,
boyfriend Big J is alleged to have said in another forum that whatever
Selly did in the house was part of her game plan, but he does not
believe she had an affair with Nando.
Selly is expected to travel
to Nigeria come Wednesday for a movie shoot and she has promised to
grant an exclusive interview live on Adom FM on her return.
Sunday, July 28 is World Hepatitis Day and
award-winning rapper, singer and songwriter Okyeame Kwame and his team
at One Mic Entertainment as well as some sponsors, are working towards a
week-long of events to create awareness about the disease.
There
is a song on Okyeame’s The Clinic album called Hepatitis which won in
the Music for Development category at last year’s Vodafone Ghana Music
Awards (VGMA).
Hepatitis B is a viral disease which inflames the
liver. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), the prevalence
rate for Hepatitis B in this country is 15 percent.
This means that one out of every six Ghanaians is exposed to the virus.
“I
appeal to the print, electronic and online media to help sensitise and
educate the public on the dangers of this disease,” Okyeame said in an
interview with Showbiz.
Annica Nsiah-Apau, Business & Brands
Development Manager at One Mic Entertainment, gave some details of the
week-long of events to mark World Hepatitis Day.
“Okyeame and his
team from MDS-Lancet Laboratories and MTN Ghana Foundation would meet
the Minister for Health on Wednesday, July 24 for discussion on
Hepatitis and the way forward in this country,” Annica said.
According
to her, Okyeame and his team will visit children affected by Hepatitis
in a hospital in Accra and make a presentation to them on Thursday, July
25.
A public screening from 10.00am to 5.00pm is scheduled for
Saturday, July 27 at the Obra Spot in Accra where Okyeame will perform
his Hepatitis song.
A special one-hour radio celebration of World
Hepatitis Day is planned by One Mic Entertainment and its associates
for Sunday, July 28.
I have followed with keen interest the news of a commercial oil find in Ghana and the optimism that it has engendered in the country. There is a welcome buoyancy in the mood of many Ghanaians as they look forward to being an oil-
producing country.
There are many people and institutions that deserve credit for the oil find — members of staff of the GNPC through to its present staff and of course to the public that patiently supported the difficult, protracted but unavoidable exploration effort. There is indeed enough credit to go round.
I cannot therefore help being disappointed that amidst all the celebrations, no mention is made of the pioneering role of Tsatsu Tsikata. When I compare the exciting prospects generated by the discovery with the state of affairs 20-odd years ago, I am reminded of the contrast between the situation of the mining sector before and after the implementation of the reforms of the mid-1980s.
I first joined the board of the Minerals Commission in September 1984. At that time, the mining sector was in a parlous state.
As a result of the work done by a few dedicated people under the leadership of Kofi Ansah, the sector was completely transformed in less than a decade. In the mining sector, we at least had the benefit of over 100 years of mining and considerable technical expertise.
The oil sector in the early 1980s did not enjoy any such stature.
I recall the scepticism with which prospects of Ghana finding oil in commercial quantities was greeted at the time. I remember in 1985, while on a trip to the U.S., asking a chief executive of one of the major oil companies why they were not showing interest in searching for oil in Ghana.
His response was that their geophysicists had told them that our geological structures were too tight and too badly faulted to host significant reservoirs.
Today, we know just how wrong those geophysicists were. One man who defied the prevailing scepticism of the time and, with a persistence bordering on stubbornness, led the efforts to get us where we are today, is Tsatsu Tsikata.
Indeed, when I shared with him, shortly after it was made, the observation by the chief executive of the oil major, Tsatsu’s response was: “Let’s all wait and see”.
Tsatsu led in the rethinking of petroleum sector policy. He led in crafting the petroleum (Exploration and Production) law that was the “investment code” for the oil sector. He led in drafting model exploration agreements including fiscal regime and Accounting Guide that is still state-of-the-art 20 years later.
He led in the development of a specific Petroleum Income Tax Law.
Beyond this intellectual and professional contribution Tsatsu emerged as a corporate leader — building GNPC itself from the ground up. His vision was sufficiently infectious to attract even hard-nosed oil men to work on Ghana’s potential, often with very little reward. However, it is in his identification, recruitment and promotion of local talent that Tsatsu truly excelled.
He was truly passionate about building the capacity of Ghanaian professionals in the sector. Companies and government’s that had dealings with GNPC were pressured into funding scholarships and providing or funding attachments for GNPC staff and even staff from related MDAs.
Tsatsu foresaw that this investment would in its own way be as valuable to Ghana as any oil find. And history has proved him right. Today, even before the first oil has flowed, Ghana has a solid cadre of industry professionals ready, given the opportunity, to lead us into the next phase of oil industry development. We have seasoned exploration geologists and geophysicists, drilling engineers, field development engineers.
We have specialised market and financial analysts and lawyers. In the late 1980s GNPC was already developing boat and helicopter services expertise for production operations. In the 1980s (20 years before the West African Gas Pipeline and before climate change became a global preoccupation), GNPC was training staff in the economics and management of natural gas.
Tsatsu was relentless, even obsessive, about the meticulous exploration of Ghana’s oil potential. He recognised that geological and geophysical data were essential preconditions for any serious effort to attract private capital into exploration efforts.
He thus focused GNPC’s meagre resources on an ambitious data project. GNPC scoured corporate and public archives around the world collecting geological and seismic materials, data and analysts from earlier exploration efforts.
GNPC then constructed the most complete database of seismic information about Ghana anywhere in the world. Then through a joint venture with the Norwegian state oil company, GNPC seismologists began to reprocess and re-analyse this data using new technology. Tsatsu did not stop with old data.
He worked with state oil companies from Canada (Petro-Canada International), Norway (Statoil) and Brazil (Petrobras) and Nigeria (NNPC’s seismic subsidiary) to acquire new data. Through these bilateral arrangements GNPC staff became familiar with modern technology such as “3-D” seismic surveys.
Eventually, Tsatsu persuaded these collaborators to support GNPC’s acquisition of the expensive computer technology to enable her Ghanaian explorationists to undertake much of this analysis in Ghana.
This in turn provided a platform for a massive upgrade of GNPC’s computer technology with positive impacts on all other sectors of its work and with distinct benefits for example for Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.
It was the availability of this extensive database and the challenging analyses of old data by Ghanaian geophysicists working under Tsatsu that made Ghana such an attractive exploration destination in the mid-’80s despite earlier skepticism.
It was the ceaseless interpretation and re- interpretation of the GNPC’s growing geological and geophysical database inspired by and supervised by Tsatsu that identified many new prospects.
Tsatsu literally set the course of Ghana’s exploration drilling for an entire generation. Those who worked with him in the sector are in a better position than I to give further details.
But I saw enough to be able to say that his investment in institution building and in exploration have contributed immensely to the recent discoveries at Cape Three Points.
For the health of our nation, for the sake of posterity and the development of a culture that recognizes selfless and dedicated service, we must all acknowledge the immense contribution that Tsatsu made to the development of the petroleum sector.
It is not too late to do so.
Sam Jonah.
