By James Adamu
The Senate has given the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) one week to reconcile multiple figures amounting to over N210trillion in its financial records from 2017 to 2023 not clearly accounted for.
The Senate Committee on Public Accounts, investigating the audited finances of the oil company, gave the ultimatum in Abuja on Wednesday when officials of the company appeared before the panel.
The panel, which is chaired by Senate Aliyu Wadada, met with a team led by the NNPCL’s Chief Financial Officer, Mr Dapo Segun.
The committee queried several conflicting submissions and records in the documents the NNPCL presented to it.
For instance, the committee raised 11 questions, including asking how it came about that National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS), a subsidiary of NNPCL, declared a profit of N9tn between 2017 and 2021, while the NNPCL itself recorded a loss of N16bn.
Wadada, explaining the issues at stake, gave details.
He stated, “The explanation of what led to the NNPC’s audited financial statement from 2017 to 2023, which of course, having looked at that document, we came up with questions.
“But the specific ones today, the most important, were the ones I asked before we eventually decided to give them all the 11 questions and then the ultimatum of one week for them to respond to.
“In the audited financial statement, they said accrued expenses was and still is, since that is what is contained in the statement, N103 trillion.
And what make up accrued expenses are, one, retention fees, legal fees and auditors fees. Retention is known, of course it is known to be 5% of total contract sum. And no reference, no mention was made to the contracts that led to this retention.
“And the retention figure is 600 and something billion. And then accrued the legal fees, no details of legal engagements that led to the fee go attached to the legal fees.”
Speaking further, Wadada said,
“And the auditors fees, we have all seen what you’ve seen, you’ve heard and listened to the audited financial statement that was produced by the auditors of NNPC. The next thing of concern is the receivables. The receivables is N103 trillion.
“Ironically, completely independent of what is contained in the audited financial statement that have got to do with these receivables, just this afternoon, before the commencement of the exercise, NNPC brought a new document, a document to the committee that is completely independent of what is contained in the audited financial statement and with items that contradict the items contained in the audited financial statement.
“This we found very ridiculous, very unacceptable by the committee.
You have listened to all that transpired and the questions are now handed over to them. It is important for the public to know each of these questions emanated as a result of what we discovered from the audited financial statement of NNPC from 2017 to 2023.
“Now, on these just two items, accrued expenses and then receivables, we are talking over N210tn.
He added, “And in this day and age, I mean, permit me to say, in Nigeria of today, that President Bola Tinubu as headmaster of the project called Nigeria, is committed to changing the narratives in the system. Changing these narratives, which is enveloped by the Renewed Hope Agenda, cannot be achieved without the needed and required funding.
“So, it is a government that needs all the support for funds to be made available to the government.
And under such a quest, these figures are mind-boggling, they are scary, they are, of course, worrisome.
“For us, as representatives of the people, we will do the best we can. I know for a fact that this will not just go down the drain.
“Well, how can it be erroneous? It is all emanated, the figures emanated from the audited financial statement of NNPC. And you’ve heard the contradictions. They said reconciliation had not been done.
So if reconciliation was not done, why did they sign off to the audited financial statement? And this audited financial statement is already in the public domain. And NNPC is planning to go to the market for an IPO.
However, the NNPCL’s team disagreed with the position of the committee, insisting that the conclusions were wrong.
The team promised to furnish the committee with the correct version within the scheduled one week.
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