The House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts has written to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to demand full record of withdrawals from the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) account.
This followed an audit query by the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation on alleged $20.3 billion illegal withdrawals from the NLNG account.
The Committee’s letter with Reference No: HR/PAC/SCO5/9NASS/QUE.9/974 dated 7th December, 2020 signed by its Chairman, Oluwole Oke, and addressed to the NNPC Group Managing Director, Mele Kyari, was made available to journalists, yesterday.
“I refer to your presentation on the above subject matter at a session with the Committee on Thursday, 3rd December, 2020 confirming the withdrawal of the sum of $20.3 billion from the account by NNPC.
“In view of the above, you are to furnish all records of the withdrawals from the account and the utilisation of the fund from inception to date,” the letter stated.
The NNPC had, in an earlier response to the committee query, via a letter with Reference No: GGM/GPAD/01 dated November 9, 2020 and signed by the Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Dr. K. A. Obateru, said it had made a presentation on the illegal withdrawals.
The letter read in part: “Following your request for information, we hereby submit 46 copies of NNPC’s presentation on the illegal withdrawals from the NLNG by NNPC and 46 copies of our response to issues raised in the Auditor General’s 2014 report on the Federation Account relating to NNPC.”
The NNPC, in an earlier letter to the Committee, with Reference No: GMD.49 dated 30th October, 2020 and signed by the NNPC Chief Financial Officer, Umar Ajiya Isa, gave the breakdown of the receipts and disbursements from NNPC NLNG Dividend Account from inception to date.
According to the corporation“In line with Government’s directive on the implementation of the Treasury Single Account (TSA), the NLNG Dividends go into the CBN/NNPC NLNG Depository USD Account domiciled with Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
“From inception to date, the sum of US$21,685,647,923.39 was received into the NNPC NLNG Dividend Account while the sum of US$20,300,772,850 was disbursed from the Account leaving a credit balance of US$1,384,875,073.39 as at 30th June, 2020 as tabulated below.”
“Initial deposit – $6,564,691.99; Dividends $18,574,610,988.35; Loan Repayment – $2,097,671,579.37; Refund of Train 6 Funding Balance – $321,817,005.33; Interest on Loan – $337,757,245.33; Interest on Account – $347,226,413.03 totaling $21,685,647,923.39 out of which the sum of $20,300,772,850 was disbursed leaving balance of $1,384,875,073.39.
The attached documents also showed that the Corporation disbursed the sum of $1,854,041.47 to NLNG secretariat; NLNG scheme 4 top up got $159.250 million; Brass LNG Scheme funding got $574,420,529.92; West African Gas Pipeline got $259,900,409; N-Gas (Takoradi, CEB Account, Gas Monitoring Station got $9,433,400; Trans-Sahara Gas Pipeline got $1,278,810.50; Olokola LNG got 216,928,550.55 while security project got $1.520 billion.
The sum of $4,372,371,348.19 was transferred to Federal Government of Nigeria; Product Importation Loan to NNPC worth $5 billion; $3,335,335,760 spent on Paris Club Refund; Sovereign Wealth Fund got $1.050 billion; $1.200 billion for 2016 JV Cash Call Balance and $2.6 billion spent on National Fuel Support Fund.
