Ramos responds to safety fears at PE oil tank farms

SAFETY ISSUES were top of the agenda when Transnet CEO Maria Ramos addressed the media in Cape Town last week ahead of her briefing to the portfolio committee on public enterprises. In the wake of the recent Island View oil tank explosions in Durban (See page 4) she had a ready response to questions over a possible repetition at Port Elizabeth’s oil tank farms, situated right next to prime residential and tourist locations in Humewood. Port Elizabeth is a working harbour and it is simply not possible to move a port, residential areas having evolved around ports over the last 100-odd years, she said. Even so, Transnet remains committed to ongoing safety vigilance, issuing instructions since the Durban incident to ensure all fire systems are operational. Responding to the ongoing dialogue over the need to relocate the manganese terminal at Port Elizabeth, Ramos made it clear that it was a question of economics. “I know, for everybody in Port Elizabeth, it’s a simple matter of moving everything to Ngqura, but the economics don’t add up; that’s the reality. Something has to make economic sense and it does not do so now.”