From ADETUTU FOLASADE-KOYI, Abuja


Senate said yesterday that the Minister of Petroleum Resources,
Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke “has something to hide” over her
alleged persistent refusal to honour invitations from its Ad-Hoc
Committee on the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment
Programme (SURE-P). This is even as there are indications that
President Goodluck Jonathan may present the 2014 budget to
the National Assembly tomorrow.
Chairman of the committee and Deputy Senate Leader, Abdul
Ningi, told newsmen yesterday that the minister has allegedly
turned down three invitations to appear before the panel to
explain alleged discrepancies in the N834.331 billion received
from the N32 deducted in the 25 billion litres of petrol fuel sold
between January 2012 and September 2013.
The committee disclosed that from its investigations, only N300
billion has so far been paid out to SURE-P.
At the sitting on November 5, the committee concluded that the
CBN and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC)
have a case to answer over the alleged fraud in the remittances to
SURE-P.
A member of the committee, Senator Kabiru Marafa, had
claimed that his colleagues observed that over N834 billion
ought to have accrued to the nation for the SURE – P if N32.00
was removed from the 770, 695, 645 litres of fuel sold in 21
months.
He said the figure was contained in an October 9 letter from the
Ministry on Petroleum Resources addressed to the committee
and signed by its Director of Finance and Accounts, Mr.
Salmanu Faskari. Speaking yesterday, Senator Ningi bemoaned
a situation where an appointee of government would routinely
shun invitations from the Senate.
At the resumed sitting of the committee yesterday, Senator
Ningi noted that the minister’s appearance scheduled for 1pm,
was re-scheduled till 2:17 pm, hoping that she would honour the
invitation.
He said that no matter what it takes, the committee would ensure
that the minister appears before the committee to explain how
the accrued funds have been expended.
His words: “This is exactly more than one and half hours after
the scheduled time for the meeting. I thought we have waited
patiently.
“I think that the Ministry of Petroleum Resources is the
custodian of the SURE-P and we feel that they have things to
hide and we strongly believe that documentation that we have
received from the ministry embarrasses us as a committee and it
should embarrass the ministry as well because simple statistics
and arithmetic is found all through their presentation.
“There are various contradictions in the statistics provided and
when we first sat here, we said this programme has not been run
transparently enough, for Nigerians to believe that this is the
programme that comes out of fewer democratic dividends.
Ningi told bemused committee members that the matter had
earlier been reported to Senate President David Mark who
promised to take up the matter with President Goodluck
Jonathan,
“I, as the Chairman of this committee, cannot outrightly say that
this is what will happen; neither can the committee say this is
what would happen. We invited the minister severally to appear;
she didn’t appear and neither did she send a representative. We
took the matter to the leadership of the Senate and the
leadership, in fact, the President of the Senate assured us that he
would take this matter to the President and Commander-in-Chief
of the Armed Forces, who in fact, hired the minister.
Meanwhile, President Jonathan is expected to present the N4.77
trillion 2014 budget to the National Assembly tomorrow.
Senator Ningi disclosed this to newsmen at the meeting of the
committee yesterday.





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I wanted to comment, but the N500bn+ missing money is numbing my mind.. Brb