The Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) yesterday said the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its subsidiary, Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) and other oil and gas companies are yet to remit a total of $22.06 billion and N481.75 billion to the Federation Account.
According to NEITI the amount is part of the unreconciled difference of its audited accounts of the companies for the year 2013 and 2014.
This figures were released at a National Conference On Remedial Issues with the theme, “Resolving Remedial Issues In The NEITI Industry Audit Reports,” held in Abuja.
A breakdown of the figures shows that NNPC is yet to remit the sum of $19.04 billion and N424.57 billion, NPDC, $2.38 billion and N51.95 billion, oil and gas producing companies $152.69 million and N5.2 billion and companies involved in offshore processing contracts $498.6 million.
According to NEITI the total losses to the federation arising from crude oil production, processing and transportation amount to $3.038 billion and N60.997 billion.
In addition, NEITI said the unreconciled difference arising from the allocation, sale and remittance of the proceeds from domestic crude allocated to NNPC during the period amount to N317.475 billion.
In his welcome address, the Executive Secretary of NEITI, Mr. Waziri Adio said the conference was put together as part of efforts to try to resolve the contentious issues usually raised by its audit team. He stated that the industry audits are usually carried out to ensure that citizens get the best value from the country’s natural resource.
He noted that merely having an audit report is not enough, stressing that the only way the report can transit to creating value for the citizens is when identified gaps in the audit are reconciled and remissions made where necessary.
Speaking of how the NEITI audit has help reconcile identified gap, he said, the NEITI audit for 2014 showed that domestic crude oil value at N2.44 trillion was unaccounted for, stating that with the advocacy initiative and reconciliation efforts of the agency, NNPC remitted the sum of N1.36 trillion into the federation account.
The balance of the outstanding according to NNPC was used to offset products subsidy, pipeline repair and crude and product losses.
Mr. Adio however noted that such practice is in violation of the constitutional provision that all revenues should be remitted to the federation account, also amounts to spending money outside National Assembly appropriations.
On his part, a representative of NNPC, Managing Director, Capital, Mr. Godwin Okonkwo, noted that most of the figures branded by NEITI has been reconciled during previous meetings with teams from the agency.
