•All unholy dealings from past regimes must be investigated
Even as the Buhari administration continues to investigate allegations of fiscal malfeasance and grand larceny in previous regimes, it appears that more revelations are emerging by the day. Two of the latest involve the US $841.645 million Abuja Rail Project and the $24 billion worth of crude oil swaps awarded between 2011 and 2014.
Both cases appear to have all the ingredients that characterise the underhand practices with which Nigerians have become all too familiar: blatant avoidance of laid-down procedure; gross abuse of power; little consideration for the cost implications inherent in the deal, and consequent huge losses to the country.
The Abuja Rail Project was allegedly awarded in 2007 without either a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) or project design, during the Obasanjo administration. This admission was made by Mr. Etim Abak, the project manager of the Chinese Civil Engineering Construction Company (CCECC), which is handling the project.
To further compound matters, the original 60.67 kilometre length was reduced to 45.245 km without a corresponding decrease in the contract sum. As if that was not bad enough, it appears that the cost per kilometre was inflated by about $10 million, given that a similar project in Zambia being undertaken by the CCECC is being built at about $4 million per kilometre, compared to the Abuja Rail Project’s nearly $14 million per kilometre.
The crude oil swap deal relates to the approval given by the former Minster of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, to oil trading companies to swap Nigeria’s crude oil for refined petroleum products between February 2011 and December 2014 without a subsisting contractual agreement. Some 45 million metric tonnes of crude were involved, with an estimated value of $24 billion.
These revelations were made by an ex-Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr. Austin Oniwon, while testifying before a House of Representatives ad-hoc committee investigating the corporation’s swap programme. He admitted that the deal was inherently unprofitable due to the heavy demurrage incurred by the NNPC and the oil spillages caused by decaying infrastructure and vandalism.
Even by the deplorable standards of the infamous Dasukigate scandal, these two latest instances of official profligacy and incompetence are deeply shocking. Both seem to testify to a routine lack of regard by public office-holders for financial regulations which are supposed to ensure that established regulations are followed.
It should have been practically impossible for the rail project to be signed without an agreed project design and MOU. Indeed, how was the contract ever awarded in the first place? Was there no competitive bidding process in which rival designs and project costs played significant roles in determining a winner?
As for the crude oil swap deal, why would the former petroleum minister permit such huge volumes of crude to be swapped for three years without a formal contract specifying the rights and obligations of all parties? There can be no doubt that the absence of terms and conditions contained in a contract virtually allowed the oil trading companies to get away with murder. The NNPC would not have been able to hold them to anything, since practically nothing was specified in the precise language of a contract; meanwhile, the companies had unfettered access to Nigeria’s crude to do what they liked with.
Revelations such as these demonstrate how deeply corruption has eaten into the national psyche, tainting government, infecting the bureaucracy, and making national underdevelopment a self-fulfilling prophecy. In resolving these cases and others like them, no effort should be spared to ensure that whatever corrupt gains were secured through these deals are forfeited and anyone found guilty prosecuted to the highest extent of the law.
CCECC and the oil trading companies should also be sanctioned for their obvious complicity in acts of corruption. The Chinese firm knew that the project cost was grossly inflated, and did nothing; it agreed to a paltry $17 million reduction, even though the length had been cut by more than 25 per cent. The oil traders agreed to continue with the oil swaps even though previous deals had formal contracts.
Nigeria’s battle with corruption is an existential one. If it is to be won, it will require the unstinting cooperation and commitment of the populace, as well as the determination and courage of government.