By Our Reporter
When Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, now baptized, Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited NNPCL, with the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, by the National Assembly, and signed into Law, by former President Muhammadu Buhari, declared a profit of N3.29 trillion in its trading activities in 2023, from a loss position of N803 billion in 2018 and N1.1 billion in 2019,Nigerians applauded Mele Kolo Kyari, the Group Managing Director, GMD, of the Company and the Management Team for the impressive performance. The impressive performance of the Company in 2023, trading year does not stop it from being a stinking Organization.
Late Moshood Kashamawole Abiola, a multi-billionaire business mogul, had said that there is nothing good about NNPC, now NNPCL, because ‘’there are several complex structures which makes the oil octopus,’’ accountability and assessment of efficiency almost impossible’’.
The Ogun state born politician, was emphatic that ‘’there are layers upon layers built on this simple thing called crude oil in NNPCL’’, noting that one would not even know whether it is crude oil or some mystery around it that is taking the money from the Central Bank . He had promised to publish the daily sales of Crude and the price at which it was sold but that was how far he could go.
Many believe that the problem of NNPL, may have started when Buhari, appointed himself as the minister of Petroleum Resources on assumption of office on May 29, 2015, a position currently being occupied by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who incidentally was a former governor of Lagos state, assisted by two ministers of state, one overseeing Crude oil and another, gas.
The argument in both official and unofficial circles was that the situation in NNPCL, may have been made worse with the appointment of Mele Kolo Kyari, who incidentally was a one-time Group General Manager, crude oil marketing, of the old NNPC, as the Group Managing Director of the newly established NNPCL, in 2018, a position he has occupied till date.
The inability of the immediate past Nigerian President and his successor to remove him from office may have made the problems of lingering fuel subsidy crisis/fuel scarcity, unsettled debts owed to foreign suppliers of petrol, and the alleged corruption in the company to be more pronounced.
Worse still, was the inability of the Kyari led Management, which has the ears of the then former atsina state born Nigerian President and the incumbent President to effectively carry out the Turn Around Maintenance TAM, of the PortHarcourt, Warri and Kaduna refineries, which had a processing capacity of 445,000b/d despite the multi- billion naira budgetary allocation for the for the rehabilitation of the refineries.
The goal post of the PortHarcourt refinery plan to resume production of petroleum products has been shifted several times while there is no sign that the Kaduna refinery will start humming by December, 2024, as promised, meaning that the refineries will still be working in bits and fits, in order to give room to the oil cabal to continue the importation of petrol into the country.
Notwithstanding that Aliko Dangote, a multi-billionaire business mogul and President Dangote Industries, who has investment in virtually every sector of the Nigerian economy had built the North American country of the United States, US, $20 billion refinery that can process 650,000b/d, which is bigger than the processing capacity of the three government three government owned refineries, located in PortHarcourt, Warri and Kaduna, with a total combined processing capacity of 445,000b/d, there have been underhand tactics I the recent time by the oil cabal to sabotage the project. Bull the NNPCL, Leadership may exposed the rot in the Company with the US 6 billion , which it owed the offshore refineries which supplies petrol to the country on credit.
Dangote, the Kano state born businessman may have described as laughable the $6 billion which Kyari, GMD, of NNPCL, had said the Company owed the oversea suppliers of petrol to the country which the companies are no longer ready to do because of the global economic crisis.
. Kyari had admitted that’’ the financial strain has placed considerable pressure on the company which was not good enough for the country as it could no longer guarantee the sustainability of petrol supply in the country which is already telling on the economy.
Chukwuma Soludo, a Professor and former governor of CBN, and now governor of Anambra state who would no longer take the excuses of Kyari, the NNPCLGMD, lamentation of the financial situation of the company had said that the Borno state born NNPCL Chief Executive officer, CEO, should be blamed for the mess in the Organisation.
The former CBN, who knows much about the workings of the Local oil Company had accused the NNPCL, under the Leadership of Kyari, of failing ‘’to remit oil revenues to the Federal Government coffers as expected over the last five months’’ .He may have shocked Nigerians when he revealed that between February, 2024 and June, 2024, an interval of five months, NNPCL, Authorities has not remitted any funds from its trading activities into the Federation Account.
The Anambra state governor, reportedly had said that the Nigerian Government finances would have been in a mess both for remittances from Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, MFR, led Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, and Federal Inland Revenue Services, FIRS, as money made available to the Revenue Mobilization and Allocation Commission, RMAC, by the two revenue generating agencies, for the monthly sharing of the three tiers of government: Federal, State and Local Governments has sustained the country since the beginning of the year and now.
Many had expected the GMD of NNPCL, to have reacted to the Anambra state governor’ revelation but he has remained silent. This may have informed why there have been pressure on the Nigerian President from several quarters to probe NNPCL, which has put the country in a very serious financial mess the same way he has probed the CBN, under the embattled Godwin Emefiele, who is still in the custody of the department of State Services, DSS which ha Adeola Aayi, as the new Director General, with the removal of Yusuf Magaji Bichi.
Segun Sani, a Chieftain of Afenifere, a Yoruba socio-cultural Organisation, who had appeared on Channels Television recently, would want the Nigerian President to take advantage of failure of the tNNPCL, to remit any money to the Federation from its trading activities in five months without properly accounting for it to probe the revenue generating agency.
An aggirieved Sani, had said that the country’s debt owed to the Paris Club, London Club and other Multi-lateral financial Institutions, including the World Bank/IMF, had multiplied between 2015 and now , due to the unaccounted expenses of the NNPCL, in the importation of petrol into the country.
Ahead of the 2027, general elections, even some aggrieved Chieftains in the ruling All Progressive Congress, APC, stakeholders , who knew that Tinubu , has fallen out of the masses because of the hardship and hunger in the country , and fears that he may lose his re0election bid, would want him to sack the NNPCL boss.
The APC , Chieftains , operating in the guise of the Tinubu Legacy Coalition , TLC, in a letter to the President on Thursday, September 11, 2024, appears to have oined the Afenifere top shot to demand for the removal of Kyari, the GMD, NNPCL.
They were said to have also demanded the sack of Gbenga Akomolafe and Farouk Ahmed, who oversees the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority. NUPRC and the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, NMDPRA respectively.
The authors of the open letter to the President: Bala Abu, eremaiah Okino, Gabriel Gbana , Princess Ajibola, and Thomas Terna, who appears to have taken the bull by the horn to speak out, as party stakeholders, were said to have sounded it loud and clear that if the oil cabals continue to stay in office in this trying times that the country is passing through the worst economic crisis ‘’it will do more harm than good to the image of the president and the APC ’’.
Whether President Tinubu will bow to such pressures, both within and outside the party to remove the trio, for putting the country in a serious economic mess , remain to the seen.
