‘No money lost,’ reacts former NNPCL official to claim of unaccounted N210tr

Former Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Umar Ajiya, said on Wednesday there was no money missing in the company.

He was reacting to claims that the company could not account for the N210 trillion mentioned in the audit request of the Auditor General of the Federation.

Ajiya disclosed this on Wednesday in Abuja after submitting his report on questions raised in the 2017 to 2023 audit report.

He said: “Mr Speaker and distinguished senators, I want to assure this committee and all Nigerians that no money has been lost.

“Many of us appearing before the committee today have, over the last five or six years, consistently presented and defended the company’s briefs and reports.

“If any money were lost during our supervision period, we would not dare publish our audited accounts.

“For more than 44 years, company financial reports were not prepared or, when prepared, were not published. In many cases, they were not even provided to the auditor general.

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“We decided to change that culture by ensuring that the report was submitted to the Auditor General and published on our website for public scrutiny.

“We want Nigerians to examine it, ask questions and help restore confidence in the NNPC by moving away from an era of obscurity.

“After carefully reviewing the report, I observed that there were two key figures who raised significant public concern.

“The first is the claim that N5.8 billion was spent to register a new company, NNPC Limited,” he said.

The CFO described the claim as inaccurate, adding that the actual amount used for registration was N2.9 billion, and was paid directly to the two government agencies.

He said the money had been paid to the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) and the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), now known as the Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS).

“This can be verified independently with both institutions,” he said.