Press Release
The Management of the
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has raised a strong objection to
the latest gambit of the former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)
and Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, who against the findings of the Senate Committee
on Finance and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has reiterated his false allegation
of unremitted $20bn oil revenue against the Corporation claiming that the
issues surrounding his allegation have not been adequately addressed.
In a statement made available
to journalists, the Corporation stated that the respected traditional ruler has
got it wrong again in much the same way his failure to grasp the issues of
remittances to the Federation Account led him into the embarrassing error of
alleging that NNPC failed to remit $49.8bn oil revenue into the Federation
Account, an allegation which has since been proved to be false even by his own
account.
“Our attention has been
drawn to the latest gambit of the former CBN governor and Emir of Kano,
Muhammadu Sanusi II, to reinvent the wheel of his false allegations against the
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation by insisting, during an interview with
Christiane Amanpour of the Cable News Network (CNN), that the issues
surrounding his allegation of unremitted $20bn have not been adequately
addressed.
“According to the royal
father, ‘One of them (issues) is the billions of
dollars being paid in kerosene subsidies without appropriation by the National
Assembly and against a presidential order and we don’t know who authorised
those payments and yet no one has owned up to say I authorised the payments, I
made a mistake’.
“But it is on record that
he (as CBN Governor) attended the hearings of the Senate Committee on Finance
where the issue of kerosene subsidy was exhaustively looked at vis-à-vis the
Presidential Memo directing the removal of kerosene subsidy. The explanation
was that the process of implementing the Presidential directive was not
followed through by the Minister of Petroleum Resources at that time as required
by law which technically meant that kerosene subsidy was not removed. It was on
the basis of this that the Senate Committee on Finance in its report
recommended that the Executive should prepare and
present to the National Assembly a supplementary budget ‘to cover the
expenditure in the sum of N90.6bn for PMS (premium motor spirit) subsidy 2012
and N685.9bn for kerosene subsidy expended without appropriation by the
National Assembly’.
“PricewaterhouseCoopers
(PwC) also observed in its recent forensic audit report thus: ‘Regarding the
issue of subsidy on DPK (kerosene) the Presidential Directive of 19 October,
2009, was not gazetted and there is no other legal instrument cancelling the
subsidy on DPK. The Senate Committee had also concluded that all that was now
required was for the FGN to propose appropriation for the unappropriated
subsidy for the period in a supplemental budget’.
“We are
therefore at a loss as to what Sanusi II meant by his statement that issues
surrounding his allegation of unremitted $20bn, especially regarding kerosene
subsidy, have not been adequately addressed.
“It would be
recalled that Sanusi II began his campaign of calumny against the Corporation
with a false alarm that it failed to remit a whopping $49.8bn being proceeds of
crude oil sales into the Federation Account.
“Upon
reconciliation of the figures with relevant agencies whereupon it was
discovered that the balance of unremitted oil revenue was actually the amount
spent by the Corporation on its operations in accordance with the law (NNPC
Act), Sanusi II began to play games with figures submitting at various times
that $10.8bn, $12, and $20bn was what was unremitted by the Corporation.
“Both the
Senate Committee on Finance and PricewaterhouseCoopers have investigated the
allegations and came out with reports exonerating the Corporation.
“Why the
royal father appears hell-bent on hanging a tag of corruption on the
Corporation even when all the inquiries into his allegation of unremitted funds
have proved otherwise remains a mystery to us.
“But we
believe that his royal dignity will be best served and preserved if he owns up
to his error of raising false allegation and apologize for same rather than
continue in error believing that if he continues to harp on his false
allegation it will someday be accepted as the truth.”
The
Corporation enjoined Nigerians and the general public to discountenance the
latest attempt to resurrect the campaign of calumny against it.
OHI ALEGBE,
Group
General Manager,
Group
Public Affairs Division,
NNPC
Towers,
Abuja
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