Malami, Ahmed Frustrating $2.4bn Oil Revenue Probe — Reps

The House of Representatives ad hoc committee investigating the sale of 48 million barrels of crude oil amount­ing to over $2.4 billion and crude oil export to global destinations from 2014 to date, on Wednesday, said Abubakar Malami, Attorney General of the Fed­eration and Minister of Justice, and Zainab Ahmed, Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, are frustrating the probe.

The committee demanded the ap­pearance of Malami to give evidence on allegations that he approved the payment of $200 million to two private firms as consultancy services fees on whistle blowers recoveries.

It is also demanding the appear­ance of Ahmed to explain her role in the said approval and payment with­out providing details of actual recoveries from whistle blowers.

The committee chairman, Hon. Mark Gbillah, said these at the resumed hearing of the investigation, noting that both ministers have been uncooper­ative with the panel despite sev­eral letters of invitation.

“We have not been getting any form of cooperation from the Ministry of Finance and At­torney General’s office regard­ing this investigation despite series of correspondents sent to them on this matter that we are investigating. We’ve seen docu­mentations from the Accoun­tant General’s office, where the minister of finance approved the payment of substantial amount of money to so-called whistle blowers, where details of mon­ies recovered were not provided.

“We’ve heard media reports by the Federal Government in­dicating that millions of dollars were recovered through whistle blower revelations on behalf of the country. But we as a parlia­ment have not seen where those monies were routed through the constitutional appropria­tion process before they were expended. The constitution is very clear about the receipt and expenditure of Nigeria’s mon­ey,” he said.

Particularly, the committee chairman said panel is inter­ested in knowing where the Attorney General derives his powers to approve payment of funds meant for the federation without recourse to the legisla­ture through formal request by the executive.

“We’ve looked at the func­tions of the Attorney General’s office and we’ve not seen any statutory powers provided for the Attorney General by the con­stitution to determine how Ni­geria’s money should be spent.

“There was an incident about a whistle blower who made a for­mal report to Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU). About $200 million paid into two com­panies accounts, Biz Plus, and GSCL, allegedly for consultan­cy services, which allegedly were approved, they said by the Attorney General’s office on the approval of Mr. President.

“We need the Honourable Minister of Finance, and the Attorney General of the Feder­ation to appear before this House to provide clarity on the inflows that have come in from whistle blowers recoveries, and about these monies that were recov­ered, and the CBN is required to provide information that has been provided by these whis­tle blowers about substantial amounts of monies that were paid supposedly and allegedly for consultancy services when there’s no record of any agree­ment entered into by those com­panies regarding any services.

“These are very weighty al­legations and as a responsible House, we owe everybody fair hearing and a benefit of doubt, and this is what we’ve been seek­ing to accord those who have been mentioned in these allega­tions. But we find it unconscio­nable that the Honourable Min­ister of Finance and Attorney General of the Federation have not bothered to respond to any of the correspondences from the committee and this in our opinion shows a lack of regard not only to the institution of the House, but that of the National Assembly as a whole.

“We will make this further appeal to the Honourable Minis­ter of Finance and the Attorney General of the Federation and all others who have not respond­ed or who have not honoured the committee’s invitations to do so in the national interest, and in the event that they fail to do so, we will be constrained to invoke the instrument of summons and all other necessary powers the National Assembly can exercise in this regard.

“But we want to make this a formal and final notice to those concerned, the Honourable Min­ister of Finance and the Attor­ney General of the Federation to cause appearance before the committee to give evidence with regard to the allegations that have been laid with regard to the questions the committee have re­quested for them to answer and to respond to,” the chairman submitted.