New National economic council sets up committee to probe NNPC missing Funds

The National Economic Council chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo on Monday set up a four-member committee to scrutinise the accounts of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and the Excess Crude Account managed by the last administration. 

The probe was meant to unravel N3.8trillion not remitted to the Federation Account by the NNPC between 2012 and May 2015 as well as $2.1bn said to have been deducted from the ECA without approval.

Zamfara State Governor, Abdulazeez Yari; Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State; Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State; and Governor Udom Emmanuel of Akwa Ibom State briefed State House correspondents at the end of the 58th meeting of the council held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. 

Yari said through a briefing by the Director of Funds, Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, Mr. M.K. Dikwa, council members got the report of the ECA and unremitted funds by NNPC.

He said, “On that line, a four-man committee consisting of the governors of Edo, Gombe, Kaduna and Akwa Ibom State was constituted to go through the books of ‎NNPC and Excess Crude as well as the Federation Account.

‎”The four-man committee will check the books of NNPC, most especially the issue of excess crude and what is not remitted into the Federation Account.

“The FG, in conjunction with the CBN, will look inwards to see how to support, how much they will give to states especially on the issue of outstanding salaries owed by the states and even the Federal Government.”

Explaining further, Oshiomhole said the meeting was the first time that the NNPC and the office of the Accountant-General of the Federation were compelled to provide information on issues concerning the total sales of Niger‎ia’s crude from 2012 to May 2015, saying that has never happened before. 

He said presentations revealed that although NNPC claimed it earned N8.1trillion between 2012 and May 2015, the corporation only paid N4.3trillion into the Federation Account.

The governor said, “We are talking about transparency; we are talking about change. And what we saw from those numbers which ‎I believe that Nigerians are entitled to know, is that whereas the NNPC claimed to have earned N8.1 trillion, what NNPC paid into the Federation Account from 2012 to May 2015 was N4.3 trillion.

“What it means is that NNPC withheld and spent N3.8 trillion.

“The major revelation here is that the entire federation, that is the Federal Government, the states and all the 774 local governments, the amount the NNPC paid into the Federation Account for distribution to these three tiers of government came to N4.3 trillion and NNPC alone took and spent N3.8 trillion. 

“This means that the cost of running NNPC is much more than the cost of running the Federal Government. That tells you how much is missing, what is mismanaged and what is stolen. There are huge figures.”

The governor said the basic law was that one does not sell and spend. 

He said there was no enterprise manager who goes to the market, sells and just begin to spend, otherwise nobody needs to budget. ‎

Oshiomhole said the only lawful way decreed by the Constitution was that if NNPC needed to spend money, it is obliged to prepare its budget like every other business enterprise, get it scrutinised by the executive and then forwarded to the National Assembly which will appropriate on it accordingly. 

He wondered that if the Federal Government could not spend without appropriation, why should any agency of government do that.