The Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) pays $6 million to Niger Delta militants as “protection fee� monthly, the House of Representatives Committee on Finance investigating the alleged non remittance of revenue collected by government agencies from 1999 to March 2008 heard yesterday.
The committee on its part also revealed that about N1.5tr out of the N3.6tr revenue generated by government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) is missing. The NNPC in its submission to the
committee yesterday said it was forced to pay the sum of $6 million monthly to militants who threatened to “deal” with the corporation.
Alhaji Abubakar Lawal Yar�adua, Group Managing Director of the NNPC, said $6m �protection fees� was paid to the militants in the Niger Delta for the security of its facilities in the troubled region. He said, “When I was repairing the Chanomi Creek pipeline, I called the boys; the contractors paid the N12million per month to supervise the lines. By the time we finished the thing, they told me they wanted $30million per month.
“I tried to convince them, set up a committee and they came to $6million. I asked them to come so that I can discuss with them. They said take it or leave it and we will deal with you and within two months, we lost crude worth $81million. So, you have to pay. That is the truth.”
Yar�adua said the NNPC generated $77.031billion and N3.930trillion between January 2003 and March 2008 and remitted to the Federation Account a total of $56.221billion and N 3.930trillion within the same period.
The NNPC submission to the committee showed that within the period under review, it recorded a total of $4.8 billion from 47, 853, 785 barrels of crude oil sold, $637 from government domestic gas sales and $4.5 billion as revenue accruing to government on NNPC�s crude take for domestic consumption.
Yar�adua blamed the discrepancies in the pricing of diesel between the NNPC and the marketers on the last administration which he said instituted two contradictory regulatory laws which allowed independent marketers to import the product and sell at any price they wished while on the other hand disallowing the NNPC to increase its supply price.
“They said everybody can import AGO and sell at any price. At the same time they regulated the NNPC to be selling at a fixed price. So, there was confusion. NNPC sold at depot price of N 61.15 but anybody who has tanker, when they go to Europe, when they buy it, in Nigeria the landing price is N143 and therefore they have to make profit.
“They were given 80% of what NNPC either import or produced. When we came on board, they imported this thing at N143 and the hope of government then was if they get 80% of whatever Nigeria produced, it would cushion whatever they have and they can sell at reasonable price.
“But as human beings, nobody sells at that reasonable price. All these people are business people and they are busy. They take the NNPC�s own and put in their own tank, import their own and sell at the maximum price,” he said.
The NNPC boss told the committee that lack of government subsidy to the corporation was threatening its existence since it buys its crude at the international market and was not allowed to increase its price.
“From 2003 to 2005, NNPC was not given any subsidy and you are aware that the crude price kept going up and the government has maintained the same prices on products. Therefore, NNPC is subsidizing the whole country.