The Federal Ministry of Finance Thursday accused the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), of not making available, financial records it would have used to answer queries raised against it in the 2021 to 2023 Oil and Gas Sector Audit report by Nigeria Extractive Industry Tranency Initiative (NEITI).

The Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Mr Raymond Omachi, made the accusation when being interrogated by Senate Committee on Public Accounts on several financial infractions raised against the Ministry in the NEITI audit findings.

One of the infractions as contained in the report, was the pre – export financing $3billion loan taken in 2012 to settle subsidy payment which according to NEITI , recovery of the loan from monthly Federation revenue proceeds under pre -export financing and project eagle agreement remains unclear.

Another query raised against the Ministry by NEITI is that “In 2021, the sum of $722.6 million was paid to NNPC by Nigeria Liquified Natural Gas (NLNG) as dividend and interest earned by Federation but was neither remitted to the Federation nor properly accounted for.”

Observation made by NEITI that in 2021, none of the refineries was operational despite N200billion spent on them, couldn’t be answered by the Ministry just as it could not provide answer to $221.283million overhead costs incured by by NAPIMS in 2021.

In his response to the queries, the Permanent Secretary said the Ministry was not directly involved in all the dealings or transactions and that the agencies involved, particularly the NNPCL, has refused to cooperate with it in terms of accurate records.

“We don’t have direct involvement in all the issues raised and required provision of financial records from the affected agencies , particularly NNPCL, NUPRC etc , is not there .

“In resolving the financial issues , we have engaged a reputable external audit firm , Arthur Andersen LLP to carry out forensic audit on all the transactions for required reconciliation,” he said.

But the committee chaired by Senator Ibrahim Hassan Dankwabo (Gombe North) , took him up on when report on the forensic audit would be ready after extending it twice by 6 months to one year.

He however insisted that NNPCL and NUPRC , should be made to be at the same session with Ministry of Finance over the issues .

He said : “I know you have enormous powers that you can use to compel these agencies to appear before us. We are having challenges bringing them to the table so that we can resolve these issues.

“We in the Federal Ministry of Finance are ready to come and sit with them here, so that you can hear directly from them and obtain the necessary explanations and clarifications”.

But the Chairman of the Committee told the permanent secretary to arrange the meeting with the affected agencies as issues involved are not only being followed in Nigeria but internationally .

“I will like you to review the internal report and arrange a meeting involving the Ministry of Finance, the NUPRC, NNPC and any other agency whose participation is necessary to resolve the issues we have raised.

“As you are aware, these issues are being followed by the international community. They are not matters confined to Nigeria; they are in the public domain and are being monitored by people across the world.

“Therefore, if there are records or issues that need to be clarified and properly put in order, we should do so in the interest of our country. All of us have no other country except Nigeria”, he said .