What we met in NNPC is absolutely shocking — Lai Muhammed

By Oluwagbenga Bankole    

The National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Alhaji Lai Muhammed has described what the present administration met in the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) as shocking, stating that they met an organisation that did not even know the number of accounts being operated..

 On a radio programme monitored by our correspondent on Radio Continental recently, Lai also said that they met an organisation that will make money, spend it and give the country whatever they thought it should take.

“We met an organisation that did not even know the number of accounts they had. We met an organisation that is richer than the country. We met an organisation that will make money and spend it and give back whatever they thought the country should take. We met an organisation that generated about N8.1trillion naira in four years, but returned to government only N4.3trillion,” he said.

He further stated that this present administration met an organisation that was receiving dividend from Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) and we did not know where the money is being paid into, revealing that was why President Buhari directed that all federal revenues should be directed into a single treasury account.

He said that Mr. President has decided to clean up NNPC by dividing the corporation into two, due to the fact that the corporation has been a custodian of corruption, saying that as time goes on they will let Nigerians know the reform NNPC is taking.

“Why is even difficult for the President to take further step is that nobody and NNPC itself did not know the various accounts where money are being paid into. From all our records, out of the $4.782billion NLNG paid to NNPC,less than $200million was paid into the federation account. Until this government came, we never knew of any dividend paid by NLNG. The first dividend they paid in June was all because we run a transparent government. The big question is what happened to the dividend that was paid before then? What happens to the dividend that was paid in 2014?” Lai said.

President Buhari said recently that he will divide NNPC into two successor entities, explaining that one of the successor companies will be an independent regulator while the second would be an investment vehicle for the country.

Recently, President of the senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, described the NNPC as the engine room of corruption in Nigeria, and also lamented that the perpetrators of illegal deals in the corporation were yet to be brought to justice.

“You hardly see where people who are the real engine room – which is the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation – where most of these corruption cases on oil are, being put on trial,” Saraki said.

Saraki made the statement when a delegation of the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) led by its president, Mr. Ayuba Wabba paid him a courtesy visit in his office at the National Assembly in Abuja.

Saraki also challenged the leadership of the Nigeria Labour Congress to assist the federal government to fight corruption by encouraging their members in the oil and gas sector to expose those behind subsidy scam in the country.