The federal government has set up an inter-agency committee to resolve the lingering row between the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) and the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) in the last couple of years.
An impeccable source who revealed this to LEADERSHIP, said that the committee was set up at the instance of the NNPC’s to President Bola Tinubu seeking reconciliation of the alleged discrepancies.
The committee, which is expected to begin sitting on Friday, at the Ministry of Finance, is mandated to reconcile the controversies surrounding the N4.2 trillion debt the federal government is owing NNPC Limited and the N2.1 trillion that the NNPC Limited is said to have failed to remit to the Federation Account.
“I can comfortably tell you that Mr President has approved the memo from NNPC Limited to set up a committee to reconcile the crisis between NNPC Limited and FAAC over the failure to remit money into the federation account,” the top industry source said.
The presidency source, who craved anonymity, said that vested interests had told the new president things that were not entirely factual, prompting the national oil company to write that the matter should be resolved once and for all.
“So many things have been told to Mr President since assuming office by some vested interests that NNPC Limited has refused to pay into the federation accounts.
“And because we want the general public to know the truth, NNPC Limited management wrote the President to investigate the matter and Mr President has graciously approved that an inter-agency committee be set up to investigate and reconcile the matter,” the industry source stated.
FAAC had severally accused the NNPC Limited of short-changing it by refusing to pay over N2 trillion to the federation account from crude sales, royalties and taxes while the NNPC Limited on the other hand had said that the federal government was owing it over N4 trillion in subsidy payment, power debt and other sundry charges.
Besides, the ministry of finance and NNPC Limited, other members of the debt reconciliation committee include the Nigerian Upstream Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) and FAAC Post-Mortem Sub-Committee.
The establishment of the committee by the President, followed a memo dated June 13, 2023 by the group chief executive officer (GECO) NNPC Mallam Mele Kyari appealing to him to intervene in the matter.
The letter stated that this was with a view to putting to rest all the allegations and counter allegations by both FAAC and NNPC Limited on the status of the debts and remittances.
Sources close to the Presidency told our correspondent, on the condition of anonymity that although NNPC Limited received several letters from FAAC requesting payment of the about N2 trillion that NNPC is allegedly owing the Federation Accounts, the Company said it could not pay any money to FAAC pending the reconciliation of the N4.1 trillion debt the federal government was owing NNPC Limited.
“The Federation owes NNPC almost N4.1 trillion and NNPC owes about 2.8 trillion to the federal government, so they should actually give us a cheque for the debt of 1.3 trillion they owe NNPC Limited,” one of the sources said.
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