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Wednesday, February 5, 2014

$20 BILLION SCAM: The Money Is Still Missing - Sanusi Lamido

Meeting is adjourned to next Thursday 10 am. Mr. Makarfi said the committee will go into actual examination of issues when it receives all responses from the parties.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Mr. Makarfi said some issues raised by CBN governor, Sanusi, in his letter to the committee, do not relate to the immediate subject of investigation.
But Mr. Sanusi said the issues raised by him relate directly to why the NNPC has not remitted money to the government account. Mr. Sanusi said what must be agreed is that NNPC shipped $67 billion worth of crude, but what came to the CBN after all reconciliation, stands at $47 billion.
“Let us know what happened to the remaining $20 billion.”
We have confirmed that the FIRS received $16 billion which was paid by IOCs. CBN has accepted that. We have accounted that out of $67 billion that NNPC shipped, $47 billion has come to CBN.
Mr. Sanusi said NNPC’s claim on subsidy on kerosene cannot stand since a presidential directivehad long barred such subsidy. “NNPC must show where it got the authority to buy kerosene at N150 and sell at N40, and then put the burden of loss on the federation account,” he said.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Mr. Okogu: I know that they have made progress with the PPPRA. This one week we are seeking will be enough for us to bring this to closure.
He said the need to deliver a satisfactory, and thorough job.
FIRS is asked by the committee whether it received part of the money as NNPC claimed, and if they did, how much, and did they remit the amount to government?
A representative of the FIRS said at the inter-agency reconciliation committee, FIRS was to account for “$15 billion” of the total $49.8 billion.
The FIRS representative confirmed the agency received “$16 billion” and remitted same.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
PPPRA representative said we have been working on the reconciliation and we have gone far. Probably before the end of the week, we would be able to conclude. PPPRA said they are still “looking for some documents”.
Makarfi said the committee cannot wait forever. The PPPRA must be able to state on the date given to them how far they have reconciled (10%, 30% or 90%, or what figure). That must be provided to the committee in writing.
Bukola Saraki: Said the process does not “instil confidence”. “For a letter that was written September, and was only made public later, why did the reconciliation not start? “It’s not the amount now, but the issue of process.”
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Bright Okogu, DG Budget:
The figure has come down from $49.8billion to about $10.8 billion. That figure has been on the table since. He said the inter-agency committee asked NNPC to provide all necessary documents to account fully for the outstanding figure.
He said the last time NNPC/ and Ministry of Petroleum were contacted last week, informally, and they said they have gone very far with the PPPRA on the reconciliation of the outstanding amount. The NNPC requested for more time.
Mr. Okogu requested for one more week to sort out all outstanding figure.
Makarfi has asked PPRA to respond. “We want to know exactly what is going on at this point,” he said.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Mr. Makarfi said the two ministers, likely Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and Diezani Allison-Madueke, have the permission of the committee to be absent due to ill health. But the committee expects that by next week, all of them will appear before it.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Mr. Makarfi said NNPC has made submission which the committee finds not comprehensive. NNPC asked to re-submit latest Feb.14.
NEITI’s response also covered only 2011. The committee wants it to send in more info by February 7.
The committee said it has yet to receive the inter-agency reconciliation report on the alleged unremitted funds.
Premium TimesAN HOUR AGO
Ahmed Makarfi: All should know that this particular hearing is basically on the issue of unremitted revenue by the NNPC.
Recalls that the first hearing last December was suspended to allow the parties involved reconcile the figures.
Mr. Makarfi said the committee wrote letters to finance ministry to ask whether the NNPC has outstanding unremitted funds.
To CBN, the committee requested the copy of the letter Mr. Sanusi sent to President and any other letter
To NNPC: The committee asked if there are unremitted funds; whether they received the CBN letter and responded. If they did, they should furnish the committee with a copy.
The committee also wrote to the Department of Petroleum Resources, FIRS, NEITI, and the ministry of petroleum resources.
AN HOUR AGO
Ahmed Makarfi, chairman of the committee, has confirmed the hearing is to investigate the alleged missing oil billions. OPEN the floor then. He is reading an address.
Welcome to our live blog of the investigative hearing being held by the Senate Committee on Finance into the alleged missing N8 trillion oil money. The hearing was initially fixed for last Thursday but was shifted till today following pressure on senators to cancel it.
Source: Premium Times
UPDATE: NNPC react
The Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Corporation (NNPC), Mr. Andrew Yakubu on Tuesday denied allegations that the $10.8billion outstanding from $49.8billion alleged mission oil revenue has risen to $20billion.
Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi had told the Senate Committee on Finance probing the $49.8billion unremitted funds to the Federation Account, that the apex bank still has $20billion unaccounted for.
But Yakubu told reporters after the meeting that Sanusi does not understand the intricacies of petroleum engineering issues.
The GMD said the misunderstanding arose from Sanusi trying to do an auditing job instead of concentration on his banking duties.
Yakubu said: “Gentlemen, you heard the Chairman very well! The issues that were raised are not new at all. You see, we came out in details because we don’t have anything to hide and we gave a detailed breakdown of the so called $49billion and we came out clearly to state the various streams that are associated with what he was talking about.
“Now, we also made in clear that NPDC, if we had anything to hide we would not have made it clear that NPDC was part of the stream, because NPDC which is NNPC’s upstream operation, is a limited liability company registered the Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA) to do upstream business jus like any other independent company.
“Now, if you are in your business, will you take your gross revenue and pass it on? What we simply said was to account for the streams that the CBN Governor erroneously captured. Now let me make this point very clearly: CBN is a banking outfit, so I really, really understand why they will not understand some petroleum engineering issues and the are not also an auditing outfit.
“Now what they try to do is to audit and I heard some statements made here that they do not have this document, they don’t have that document. They are not the auditors. We have certified bodies and arms of agencies that are charged with the responsibility of auditing.
“They are banking right? So what he said was not really new. We said clearly that we stated an amount that went to NPDC and that amount was the gross lifting. But there are other streams that go back to government in terms of taxes just like any other business player.
“So we have Royalties, we have Petroleum Profit Tax and so on and so forth. Now these are subject of other detailed discussions and investigations and they are open.
“We give access to the Auditor General of the Federation, we give access to Accountant-General, we give access to agencies that have business to do with auditing our own business.
“And at the Federation Account too we render this report as you are told on monthly basis and these are issues that are subject of reconciliation on monthly basis.
“So really for issues like this to come to the public glare again becomes worrisome that we throw away numbers, we throw away allegations that at the end of the day we clarify but then the damage would have been done,” Yakubu stated.
Source: The Nation

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