Business Desk TDC records drop in profits

Tema Development Corporation (TDC) has recorded a dip in its profit for the year 2015. The Corporation’s profit for 2015 declined by 15.1 percent.

TDC also saw its profit for 2015 drop to GH c 40.42 million from the GH c 47.59 million recorded in 2014.

The Corporation’s profit before tax dropped to GH c 8.78 million in 2015 as compared to the GH c 25.09 million it recorded a year earlier.

The Board Chairman of TDC, Mr. Emmanuel Oko Adjetey who disclosed this at the sixth Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Tema on Wednesday, said as a result of the dip in profits, the Corporation was unable to declare any dividend in respect of the 2015 operational year.

Mr. Adjetey explained that 2015 was a tough year for most business due to Ghana’s economic challenges and the Corporation was no exception.


INJUNCTION
The Corporation was hit with a law suit after some persons in the Community 24 area dragged TDC to court over a dispute on the Community 24 Site and Services Project.

This led to an injunction being placed against the TDC restraining if from carrying out any activity on the site which was expected to turn out over 1,400 fully serviced residential and commercial plots including 13 kilometers of internal road network, 27 kilometers of drainage system and 6 kilometers of storm water drains.

The Board Chairman explained that the court injunction caused a major setback for the Corporation and created serious liquidity challenges for the Corporation.

He also sited the in-filling project at Community 1 site 3 and the Community 2 offices and Shops Complex projects which he said were all financed solely from, TDCs internally generated funds as a contributing factor for the dip in the Corporation’s performance in 2015.

URBAN REDEVELOPMENT
Mr. Adjetey pledged the Corporation’s commitment towards the implementation of the redevelopment programme to ensure a successful regulation of Tema into a world-class urban environment as conceived 63 years ago by Ghana’s founding fathers he said the initial phase of the development programme will cover the Kaizer flats in Community 4, Sites 1, 2 and 3 in Communities 1 and 2

Shareholders of the Corporation passed a special resolution authorizing the directors to transfer GH 50 million from the income surplus account to stated capital as a way of restructuring the capital mix of the Corporation.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING
The Managing Director of TDC,  Mr Joe Abbey, said the Corporation made significant progress on the Kpone Affordable Housing Project. According to him, overall wroks progressed to 98.5 per cent on eight of the twenty-four blocks handed over to it by the government. He said work on the an additional eight blocks has began and when completed will provide 122 apartments.
Mr Abbey disclosed that the Corporation has started a project to deploy the Geographic Information System Technology to effectively digitise, map out and demarcate the Tema Acquisition Area enclave.

The Chief Director of the Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Alhaji Ziblim Yakubu commended TDC for contributing to the planning, developing, and managing the Tema Acquisition Area in the last 60 years.

He particularly commended TDC for consciously making the efforts to pay its dividends on yearly basis to the government and urged other agencies under the ministry to emulate the TDC to ensure more revenue to the government for accelerated development.

APPRAISAL
The Executive Chairman of the State Enterprise Commission, (SEC),  Dr Camynta Baezie while commending the TDC for its exceptional performance over the past six years disclosed that for the 2017 performance contract year, the SEC will introduce two additional performance measures  as part of its scoring.

These are the extent to which State Owned Enterprises (SOE) do business with each other and the incorporation of anti-corruption practices by the SOEs.
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Writer’s email: benjamin.glover@graphic.com.gh