Senator Ahmed Mohammed Makarfi, former governor of Kaduna State and chair of the Senate Committee on Finance, speaks in this interview with TONY AKOWE on several national issues, including the allegation of missing money at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and crude oil theft. Excerpts:
Your Committee just submitted its report to the Senate on the allegation of missing money made by the suspended governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi. Can we have an overview of the report?
Well, our report is not final; we made certain interim recommendations, and there is an ongoing forensic audit and such recommendations will be subject to the outcome of the forensic audit. In our report, the Auditor General of the Federation and PriceWaterHouse, the external forensic auditors, are requested to forward the forensic audit report to us.
That is what will certify whether the certification by PPPRA which is about 10 million dollars was correct, understated or overstated and by who. So, there are some of the recommendations that are subject to the outcome of the forensic audit and that is why I said it is not a final report. I have seen that major aspects of the report are captured in the papers. However, it is not yet a decision of the Senate because the Senate still has to consider our recommendations. We were asked to find out the whereabouts of some monies.
For 47 billion dollars out of the 67 billion dollars, there was no dispute at all right from the time we started our sitting that the money was in the Federations Account. Where there was dispute was between the figure of 10.8 billion dollars and 20 billion dollars. Even that dispute did not state that the money was really missing, but what has been done with that money. It was not stated at that time that the money was missing, but that it was not remitted to the Federation Account. If it was not remitted to the Federations Account, it could be hanging in one account or the other. We took the larger figure of $20 billion so that we can investigate what happened to that money. Out of that money, five and half billion dollars was spent on PMS and what we needed to do was to find out if the money was appropriated. We checked the budget of the relevant ministries and discovered that the National Assembly appropriated the money. So, if the National Assembly appropriated money and it was expended, you cannot talk about money missing. Another four and half billion dollars was expended on subsidy on kerosene. But unlike that of petrol, the money was not appropriated by the National Assembly, but there was evidence and certification that the money was spent. Again, there is a difference between missing money and money spent without appropriation. You know what it was used for, but the fact is, was it authorised by law? It was not authorised constitutionally because all monies to be spent are supposed to be appropriated by the National Assembly. That takes care of 10 billion dollars out of the 20 billion dollars. One part of the money was budgeted for and spent, while another part was not budgeted for, but spent. We also discovered that about 8 billion dollars of the money does not entirely belong to the Federations Account. Our job was to determine how much of that money belonged to the Federation Account.
Why was the money not entirely for the Federation Account? For example, I have a business and I need money to finance the business to make profit, but I don’t have money and I looked for other investors to invest and recover their money while we share the profit. Right from the beginning, it is wrong to assume that the entire money belongs to me because you have to take your money and your profit from the gross earning. That was the accounting that was done wrongly. What the person who makes the allegation alleged was that he believed that part of that money belonged to the Federation Account and our job was to find out how much of that money belonged to the federation, and has it been paid into the federation account? We determined how much belonged to the federation account and how much has been paid into the federations account and how much has not been remitted. Yes, there are monies that have not been paid into the federation account and we determined that it was substantially money belonging to other people and not the federations account. But even the money belonging to the federations account, not all of it has been remitted. It is all stated in the report and we made recommendations that those monies belonging to the federations account and not yet remitted should be remitted to the federations account. Even the agencies involved did not dispute our calculations and computations, but gave one excuse or the other and we asked them to remit it and show us evidence that it has been remitted. That resolved the issue of 8 billion dollars which is the most complex issue because it is money belonging to other people and so, we had to take time to decide how much belongs to who. We did that and our recommendation is in line with what we have determined to be shares for each party. But as I said earlier, even the share for the federations account, not all of it has been remitted and there is no dispute about that. That leaves 2 billion dollars to be accounted for, which the NNPC explained were expended in the cause of generation of revenue. This is different from spending on subsidy. The constitution allows for some expenses in the course of generating revenue. Whatever you are going to remit is net of the expenses related to generating the revenue. Our job was first to find evidence they were wholly and exclusively spent in the area of generating that revenue and that is the area we say we don’t have the required expertise and so, we appointed two firms of forensic auditors, gave them the documents and said, verify these things and they made a report to us on how much was liable and how much cannot be defended. What cannot be defended, we recommend that it be refunded. So, that basically accounted for the 20 billion dollars you are talking about.
Were there areas your committee did not look into?
There are areas that we have not looked into and we stated so in the report. Such areas include crude swap, strategic alliances which involve contracts over transfer of assets. Whereas they have an impact on how much you generate, it does not affect account for the 67 billion. You account for the 67 billion first and then know how much is missing. I am going into this area because this is the area that can hurt the nation more because if you enter into a contract that continues to deprive government of needed revenue, that is a very serious business,
From what you have said, did Sanusi miss the point?
He did not miss the point in the area of subsidy on kerosene. Even before Sanusi raised the point about subsidy on kerosene, we had raised this matter with the NNPC and so, it was not new to us because he was not the first person to raise it. We got to know that money was spent that was not appropriated and then, his letter came and so, it was nothing new. He was right in the area of kerosene subsidy being spent without appropriation. He said that the late President Yar’Adua gave instruction to stop kerosene subsidy; we are not disputing that there was such an instruction. But there was never a time even under Yar’Adua that government stopped paying subsidy on kerosene. So, continued payment of subsidy on kerosene is not limited to the current government. It was an issue that continued even under the President that gave the instruction in writing. So, inadvertently, government must have given an instruction which it did not abide by. Who took the action? Some people feel that the NNPC on its own took the action or maybe the minister took the action. But we have evidence that the President is aware and consents to it. So, if the President is aware and consents to it, you cannot pick one Director or one individual and heap the blame on him. That was why we recommended that since the President is aware and consented to it, the constitution says where that happens, he should prepare a supplementary budget and bring to the National Assembly and if they like, they will approve it or sanction him. But until he does that, you can’t commence any action until he does that. Based on our report, if the National Assembly feels that it wants to take any particular action, our report is there and we have confirmed that some monies were spent without being budgeted for. We have also confirmed that some money was not remitted and how much it was, but it is nothing near the amount he was talking about and we have recommended what needs to be done.
