Your absence from investigative hearing attempt to frustrate House probe, Gbajabiamila tells CBN, NNPC, others

THE Speaker of the House of Representatives, Honourable Femi Gbajabiamila, on Tuesday expressed displeasure with the failure of the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the Group Managing Director of Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited to attend the investigative hearing into the actual daily consumption of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) in Nigeria. 

Gbajabiamila made the remarks during the flag-off of the investigative hearing into the ‘Ascertain the actual daily consumption of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) in Nigeria’, chaired by Honourable Abdulkadir Abdullahi. Gbajabiamila, who was represented by the deputy majority leader, Honourable Peter Akpatason, observed that the House also mandated the committee to not restrict its findings to the NNPC records alone, but liaise with experts in the industry, transport workers, and all other stakeholders to determine an independent finding for the benefit of Nigerians. 

The speaker said, “Only last week, the news was awash with the trading of blames between the NMDPRA and IPMAN over bridging the gap as a result of the rising cost of IPMAN’s operations, reportedly to the tune of over N70 billion in the interim, to address the lingering fuel scarcity. 

“The National Assembly in the repeal and re-enactment of the 2022 Appropriation Act has projected the cost of subsidy for PMS to be over N4 trillion. 

“In view of the above, the House of Representatives has constituted and mandated the ad hoc committee on the volume of fuel consumed daily in the country, to engage the key operators in the sector, so as to leverage your expertise and experience in the industry and come up with a solution required for effective planning, supply and distribution of the PMS in Nigeria.” 

While noting that the amount being expended on fuel subsidy as reeled out by the apex bank and NNPC on the fuel subsidy are doubtful and contested by concerned stakeholders, Gbajabiamila frowned on the failure of all the accounting officers to honour the invitation of the ad hoc committee. 

He said, “Now you have been given the opportunity to come here and show us what you know. Bring out facts that will either confirm or controvert the stories that are out there, so that at the end of the day, we are able to act on facts. But here we are. 

“I know NNPC hardly absents itself from this kind of investigative hearings. They wrote a letter, which is quite commendable, but it’s appalling that such letter will come in at this point and there is no single representative that will come and explain why the company cannot appear before submitting the letter. 

“CBN paid these monies and people are disputing the figures that they are churning out to defend their position or clear the air. Is it that they are not taking the parliament seriously or what is that? 

“I want to make it very clear that it is not acceptable to the parliament, that people, organisations that are saddled with the responsibility of managing the critical assignments like the distribution and accounting for the distributed and sale of PMS in this country will be reluctant to come here to do their duties. 

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“So, we want to see this attempt by critical stakeholders to absent themselves from this investigative hearing as an attempt to frustrate the efforts of the committee and the parliament will not take it likely. 

“And I want to say the subsequent meetings those of you who are not here, the major organisations that are not here, a lot of them are not here. Ministry of petroleum resources, who on earth will believe that the Ministry of petroleum resources will not be present here and will not send any message? Ministry of Finance not here also; Central Bank of Nigeria not here; office of Accountant General, the popular office of Accountant General is not represented by anybody. 

“Federal Inland Revenue Service is not here. This is not fair. Even PPMC is not here, they are the ones distributing and they are not here? This is not acceptable. Chairman I thought I should make this point so that you can carry on from there.” 

Earlier, chairman of the ad hoc committee expressed concern over the re-occurrence of incidences of fuel scarcity; controversies and concerns generated over the huge sums of money being paid as oil subsidies and the inaccuracy of data required for effective planning, supply and distribution of the PMS.