By Adewale Sanyaolu
Capital Oil and Gas Industries Limited has called on the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to put machinery in place towards reconciliation of both parties’ account over an alleged missing 82 million litres of petrol, worth N11 billion.
The call may not be unconnected with claims from the state oil corporation, at the weekend, that Capital Oil could not account for about 82 million litres of petrol in its custody.
But, Capital Oil and Gas, in a statement by its management, made available to Daily Sun in Lagos, yesterday, said the company had trucked out over seven billion litres of petroleum products for NNPC over the last few years, making it its largest partner in the downstream sector.
Capital Oil explained that NNPC has a subsisting contract with it, adding that the corporation has consistently been in breach and default of the contractual agreement by owing it money for services rendered.
‘‘Payments from NNPC for services rendered by our company has consistently been delayed for periods spanning over one year and remains unpaid till date. Currently, NNPC owes us for services rendered to it at very critical periods to salvage nationwide fuel scarcity since 2015 (more than two years now) amounting to millions of dollars and billions of naira,’’ Capital Oil stated. On the other hand, the company claimed that the corporation had failed to deliver products which were duly paid for, and said it had written the NNPC, severally, requesting its outstanding payments and delivery of products duly paid for. ‘‘Rather than honour our request, we are shocked that the corporation had resorted to this needless campaign of calumny, while refusing to make payments and deliver our products to us till date.”