Senate chides NTA DG over 11-year unprofitable joint venture

Director General (DG) of the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), Mohammed Ibn Yakubu, came under fire on Monday, his second appearance before the Senate joint Committees on Finance and National Planning, Co-chaired by Senator Solomon Adeola (Finance) Senator, Olubunmi Adetumbi (Chairman Senate Committee on National Planning).

The NTA DG drew the ire of senators when he declared that the business relationship between the Nigerian Television Authority and the Chinese owned Startimes which has been on for 11 years has been unprofitable.

This followed the failure of the NTA management to present before the Senate joint committee on Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) their budget performance for the last three years as part of their defence of the MTEF and other documents to enable the committee to assess her funding status.

The Senate had on Friday demanded the NTA management provide the joint committee with their books to ascertain their funding requirement and gaps if any and advise the Senate on funding for the state-owned television Authority in the 2021 fiscal year.

The management of the NTA led by its Director-General, Mohammed Ibn Yakubu returned to the Senate without the relevant documents on its finances.

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When probed on the revenue generated by the partnership between the NTA and Startimes through its special purpose vehicle NTA TVEnterprises, he said it has been eleven years of declaring losses on an annual basis.

Asked to provide the documents for further engagement, the DG said he did not come with it.

The Co-chairman then said: “We also asked you for records of every joint venture account. Is it not only Startimes that you have a joint venture with what? Are the other terms?

“We need the joint venture details you, don’t have all of that here. I think we have to accept that NTA is an exceptional institution that has serious challenges of balancing its books and reporting openly and transparently on its finances, Senator Adeola told Yakubu.

In his reaction to the revelations the NTA DG, Senator Ayo Akinyelure condemned the attitude of the NTA management which he noted was improper.

He wondered how anyone would continue with an agreement that has posted losses repeatedly in spite of having over one million subscribers on its platform.

According to Akinyelure “Startimes operating with you and operating on your facilities for 11years and no return on investments and you still continue with the agreement?

“Then something is cooking. There is a syndicate there and there is a need to audit them and we must audit all the DGs.

“This is unfair to Nigeria as a nation and therefore, this committee will investigate this affair to the bottom back to the agreement 11 years ago, Senator Ayo Akinyelure stated.

The Senate also insisted that the Presidential Task Team on COVID-19 must pay the NTA the debt of N1.8bn they learnt the Television stated that it is owed by the PTT because the Senate had approved funds to cover for intervention during the COVID-19.

Akinyelure said: “There is a provision in the project, the N500 billion intervention was approved by the senate for COVID-19 and I believe publicity is there.

“This National Assembly approved N500bn for COVID-19. NTA is a separate entity, like any other, that N1.8b must be recovered from the Presidential task force on COVID-19.

“They can not because NTA is owned by the government they will be treating you as their baby and therefore what is due to them as income will be denied them.

“So raise the invoice for this N1.8b and go to the PTF and collect it and go to consolidated revenue account and pay the money there,” Akinyelure submitted.

Earlier in his submission, Yakubu has told the Senate that the reason the state-owned broadcast station remits monies considered small given her N10bn subvention was that it was being owed for live coverages by government agencies an example of which is the COVID-19 publicity.

He said the publicity cost of the COVID-19 with the Presidential Task Force stands at N1.8bn and it has made efforts on two occasions to get the money but was told to hold on as a certain amount was being considered for the Television Authority.

The Senate asked him to return on Tuesday to with all books on its finances as well as the two correspondences to the Presidential Task Team for the payment of the N1.8bn publicity for COVID-19.

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE