University of Mines and Technology, UMaT, has qualified for the grand finale of the ‘Gas Challenge’ competition after beating the University of Cape Coast and Takoradi Technical University in the final zone 3 contest.
UMaT won with just a two-point lead over TTU, and will be at the grand finale with the University of Ghana and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, who have already qualified from zone 1 and 2 respectively.
Despite being the reigning champions of the competition, UMaT, came well-prepared and highly motivated to the zone 3 contest hosted by Takoradi Technical University and managed to win in 4 out of the 5 rounds of the contest.
Although the Takoradi Technical University came second in the competition, their contestants outshone both UMaT and UCC when it came to the actual problem-solving and calculations in round 2 with UMaT and UCC basically performing abysmally.
After the fifth round of the contest, with questions surrounding policy and operations about Ghana’s petroleum industry, especially Ghana National Gas Company, UMaT won the zone 3 contest with 60 points, closely followed by Takoradi Technical University with 58 points and the University of Cape Coast coming last with 57 points.
About the challenge
The Gas Challenge is an inter-tertiary level quiz competition initiative by the Ghana National Gas Company to deepen students’ understanding about their operations as well as Ghana’s Petroleum Industry to help develop students’ interest in the petroleum industry.
Speaking at the event, the Senior Manager for Government Relations at Ghana Gas, Augustine Asare Osei, said the Gas Challenge is not only educating the youth about the petroleum sector but providing job opportunities.
“As part of our vision, the Gas Challenge is to equip and ensure that the future of gas in this country is being driven by our young people. As I stand here, finalists of the 2019 competition and to be specific the winners and also the first runner-up after they did their national service at the Ghana National Gas Company are official staff of Ghana Gas.”
“I encourage you to really work hard and understand that knowledge is indeed power. Perhaps they would have never got the opportunity to work at Ghana Gas but through this medium, we were able to scout the very best for our industry to take over the industry. It’s about time that we take over our industry as Africans and Ghana Gas is one of the industries in this country that is fully indigenized where from the top, CEO to the last staff is all indigenous people, and you are all helping to make sure that the indigenization agenda is properly executed“, she said.
Augustine Asare Osei, who also doubles as the Chairperson for the Gas Challenge Committee, in reacting to questions about the limited problem-solving line-of-questions in the competition as well as a protest by some institutions over the unfair award of points told Citi News it is a concern the committee will look at.
“It is something that the committee would need to review and look at. However, we do recognize that we need to perhaps modify the nature of the questions, but that is something that the committee needs to consider, and we will come back to you on that.”
“I think the competition was very healthy despite some protest, and that tells you also how keen the competition was, it was extremely close… We have mechanisms in place to deal with this type of protest, so it’s just a healthy one”, she added.
The Vice-Chancellor of TTU, Rev. Prof. John Frank Eshun, while commending Ghana Gas for choosing TTU to host the zone 3 competition, described the Gas Challenge as timely for promoting the protection of the environment in the current face of global warming.
“Indeed, the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals 1, 7 and 13, respectively seek to end poverty in all its forms everywhere, ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all, and take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. Gas is one of our many God-given resources which can power our industrialization agenda and create the jobs necessary to end endemic poverty, provide a secure and equitable energy supply and do so in an environmentally sustainable manner even as we transition into a low-carbon future. The Gas Challenge is, therefore, a timely initiative that will educate us all on a key resource which must be properly leveraged in order to achieve our shared environmental and socio-economic aspirations”, he said.
