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Tongues are wagging at the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum over the decision to give the oil rich Tano Shallow Water Concession to A-Z Petroleum although it is relatively the less experienced company as compared to the over ten drilling companies which applied for the same oil block. According to a source at the Ministry, the decision to give the oil block to A-Z which is however awaiting Cabinet approval, stirred controversy because �the Deputy Minister of Energy, Benjamin Dagadu is a former Managing Director of A-Z Petroleum�. According to the source, �it would take the personal influence of a personality like that to give an oil block to A-Z when giants like Padembo, ENI, Miura and others were in the same competition� Mr. Dagadu, until April 2013, the source revealed, was the General Manager of A � Z Petroleum Products Ghana Limited. �Mr. Dagadu as Manager of Field Evaluation and Development Department of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation worked on the Tano fields and so knows the terrain very well�, revealed the source. The Deputy Minister declined to comment when The New Crusading GUIDE sought an interview as he directed the paper to go to the Ministry. �I have no comment. Go to the Ministry and talk to Bawa, the Communications Director�, directed the Deputy Minister. The source further revealed that it is only A-Z Petroleum Company in the oil business which is on the verge of being given three oil blocks to drill. He mentioned the three blocks as Tano Shallow Water Concession, Gasop Relinquished Block and the Takoradi Offshore Black. The source hinted that A-Z Petroleum �would in turn sell the block off to a different company because it has not got the capacity to undertake the project.� He hinted further that there was more to the claim of the Minister of Energy�s signature being forged and challenged the Ministry to publish the said letter which bore the forged signature. �If that letter is published, you will see many companies produced the same and similar letters�, added the source. The source therefore appealed to President John Mahama to �pay serious attention to how the blocks are being sold off and if possible set up an investigative team to comprehensively deal with it since it is denting the image of the country� Acquisition of oil blocks has generated some concerns with the Africa Centre for Energy Policy (ACEP) expressing the fear that �Ghana is throwing out promising oil blocks to relatively inexperienced oil companies� and that the �contracts are being awarded at the blind side of Ghanaians, who are the primary owners of Ghana�s oil and gas resources�. �Ghana must show an example of a country determined to break away from the oil curse by being transparent�, articulated on industry watcher. Please stay tuned for further developments �