NNPC cannot account for $20bn, Sanusi insists
The Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria,
Mr. Lamido Sanusi, on Tuesday said the Nigerian National Petroleum
Corporation had yet to remit to the Federation Account $20bn out of the
$67bn it realised from crude oil sale on behalf of the Federal
Government.
Sanusi, who stated this when he appeared
before the Senate Committee on Finance currently investigating the
alleged non-remittance, also explained that he had submitted a 20-page
document backed up with another 30-page appendix to prove his point.
The CBN boss told the Senator Ahmed
Makarfi-led committee that certain level of reconciliation had been
achieved from the meetings the bank had with the NNPC and other relevant
agencies since the allegation of the unremitted funds became a public
issue.
He said, “The NNPC did a presentation.
We had all agreed that $14bn out of the $67bn they shipped came in to
the dollar account of the federation.
“We have looked at the Federal Inland
Revenue Service numbers and we have confirmed that $16bn paid
by the
International Oil Companies to the FIRS account was not paid by the NNPC
but paid by the IOCs.
“It was the proceeds of the crude lifted
in the name of the NNPC but sold on behalf of the FIRS. That $16bn had
been confirmed by the FIRS and accepted. There is the $1.6bn that the
Department of Petroleum Resources also received from the IOCs, which is
part of that crude and which the CBN has accepted.
“We have provided evidence in the naira
crude account that out of the $28bn domestic crude shipped by the NNPC,
it had repatriated $16bn. Out of the $67bn that has accrued to the NNPC
account, we have accounted for $47bn.
“That is, out of the $67bn that the NNPC
shipped, $47bn had been repatriated to the CBN. What we are talking
about is the balance of $20bn and what explanations had been given.”
Sanusi told the committee that the NNPC
had said some of the proceeds from the crude sale did not belong to the
Federation Account, but noted that it was established during the
reconciliation meetings that some of the crude shipped by the Nigerian
Petroleum Development Company was from oil wells belonging to the
federation.
He also accused the NNPC of transferring revenues that should go to the Federation Account for remittance.
Sanusi said, “I have given free legal
opinion to this committee on the unconstitutionality and illegality of
that transaction. Secondly, the NNPC had explained that 80 per cent of
that money yet to be repatriated was spent on kerosene and fuel subsidy.
“I have submitted to this committee
written evidence of a presidential directive eliminating subsidy since
2009 and the NNPC needs to provide its authority for buying kerosene at
N150 and from the Federation Account and selling at N40, and inflicting
that loss on the federation.
“The NNPC had also said that it was DPR,
but for us in the CBN, every month the NNPC sends report to the FAAC.
And every month, the NNPC indicates how much it has deducted as PMS
subsidy.
“From April 2012 to date, the NNPC has
submitted reports to the FAAC consistently showing it is deducting
nothing from PMS; so, we are surprised that having submitted nil returns
since April 2012, we are now being told that deductions were being
made.
“I don’t know whether they were made and
whether the DPR had approved them. We are waiting for the
reconciliation with the PPPRA. The other part of third party financing,
which was not appropriated, had no documentation or proofs.
“All we have said at the CBN and to
which there is no disagreement is that the NNPC shipped $67bn worth of
crude; we have established that $47bn has come back to the federation.
“There is a $20bn balance that has not
come back to us. The burden of proof is on the NNPC. We have made
suggestions that can help to answer some of the explanations and we
believe that even some of what they claimed were shipped by the NPDC
does not belong to the NPDC but to the federation.”
But the Group Managing Director, NNPC,
Mr. Andrew Yakubu, told journalists after the meeting that the
corporation was still reconciling its accounts and that it was currently
at the point of conclusion of the reconciliation process with the
various agencies.
He said it was at the end of it that he
would submit the detailed reconciled position, which the committee would
study and then review in details.
“That is where we are and what we
reported is the true position of things; we are at the point of
concluding our reconciliation, and as you are aware, the major chunk of
the amount in question, over 80 per cent of it is in the subsidy for
both PMS and kerosene,” Yakubu said.
He noted the Director-General of the
Budget Office, Dr. Bright Okogwu, complained that the CBN had yet to
submit any document for the reconciliation and wondered why it did not
do so.
Yakubu said, “We are at the point of
concluding reconciliation, we have been reconciling with the PPPRA on
the subsidy documentation for the PMS and kerosene and the PPPRA
testified to that; we are at the point of rounding up the major chunk of
the entire amount in question.
“As soon as that is done, we will reconcile, sign off and do a formal presentation to the committee.”
On the fresh allegation of unremitted
$20bn, Yakubu said, “You heard the chairman (of the committee) very
well; the issues that were raised were not new at all; we don’t have
anything to hide and we gave a detailed breakdown on the so called
$49bn.
“We came out clearly to state the
various streams that are associated with what he (Sanusi) was talking
about. We made it clear; if we had anything to hide, we wouldn’t have
made it clear that the NPDC was part of the stream.
“The NPDC, which is part of the NNPC
upstream operation, is an NNPC upstream limited liability company
registered under the CAMA (Companies and Allied Matters Act) to do any
upstream business like any other independent company; if you look in
your business, will you take your gross revenue and pass it on?
“What we simply said is to account for
the streams that the CBN governor erroneously captured; now, let me make
this point very clear, the CBN is a banking outfit; so, I really don’t
understand why they will not understand some petroleum engineering
issues.
“They (CBN) are also not an auditing
outfit; now, what they are trying to do is to audit and make some
statements that they do not have this document, they do not have that
document; they are not auditors, we have certified bodies and arms of
agencies that are charged with the responsibility of auditing, they are
in banking.
“We have royalties; we have petroleum
profit tax and so on; these are subject of other detail discussions and
investigations, and they are open. We gave access to the
auditor-general, accountant-general and agencies that have business to
do with auditing our own business, and the Federation Account too.
“We render this report as you are told
on monthly basis; 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. We throw away numbers, we throw away
allegation that at the end of the day we clarify; but then, the damage
would have been done.”
