Some members of the House of Representatives have disagreed over the
decision of the house to instigate a probe into alleged scams in the
Refined Product Exchange Agreement otherwise known as Crude oil swap
contracts.
The Rep members; Hon. Obinna Chidoka of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP
and Mojeed Alabi, All Progressive Congress, APC, said the decision was not
only ill-informed but based on controversial figures that had been
previously disputed by the National Extractive Industries Transparency
Initiative, NEITI.
While Mr. Alabi argued that the motion was lacking in research and date
accuracy, Mr. Chidoka said the figures quoted were not correct.
Recall that NEITI’s Director of Communication, Dr. Orji Ogbonnaya Orji,
had previously refuted erroneous news report which claimed that the agency
said the nation was losing $8 billion annually from the crude swap
arrangement.
“The media report from that presentation attributed to NEITI that the
nation loses $8 billion annually through crude oil Swap is not only wrong
but misleading.
“What NEITI presented and explained at that hearing was that there is no
cost efficiency in the transactions with the offshore processing
organizations,” the Director said in his statement refuting the report.
Nevertheless, the House of Representatives resolved to go ahead and
investigate the alleged scams in crude oil swaps contracts, involving the
Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation and some companies.
The motion was sponsored by Michael Enyong, from Akwa Ibom State, the
House at its sitting on Wednesday.
He said a barrel of crude amounts to 159 litres and if a barrel is
multiplied by 445,000 barrels, it would amount to 70,775000 litres per
day, whereas Nigeria daily consumption is 40,000,000 litres per day.
But Victor Ogene, PDP Lagos State supported the motion, citing the
amount of money involved and the importance of the subject.