The Senate Committee on Public Accounts has resolved to summon the heads of NMDPRA, NNPCL and NEITI to explain conflicting petrol import records for 2022 and 2023.
The panel rejected the explanation presented by the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority after comparing its figures with those of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited. The inquiry concerns queries in the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative’s oil and gas audit for 2021-2023.
NMDPRA recorded 3.29 billion litres of petrol imports in 2022 and 6.02 billion litres in 2023. NNPCL’s corresponding figures were 6.27 billion litres and 3.88 billion litres, according to the figures presented to the committee.
Premium Times reported that the committee announced the resolution on Tuesday, October 20. The heads of the three organisations are to attend a joint meeting to explain the differences and work towards reconciling the records.
NMDPRA representative Uzoamaka Ugwu-Ojobe maintained that the regulator’s figures were credible. Committee members rejected her description of the differences as slight and called for a fuller investigation.
Senator Abdul Ningi said the gaps were too wide to be treated as minor. Senator Anietan Bassey called for an investigation to establish why the records differed and identify those responsible if wrongdoing was found.
The records remain disputed; the committee’s summons does not establish that fraud occurred. Daily Trust reported that the date of the joint hearing was yet to be announced.
Sources: Premium Times, Daily Trust
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