From Kemi Yesufu, Abuja
The House of Representatives Committee on Petroleum (Downstream) has asked the Dr. Ifeanyi Uba led management of Capital Oil and Gas to appear before it today (Thursday) or face legislative sanctions.
This is as the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) told the Joseph Adelaja led-committee that it recovered N2 billion from Capital oil and Gas from the N11 billion worth of petroleum products belonging to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) warehoused in its tank farms.
The Committee said the summons was issued to the firm, due to the inability of the Committee to successfully serve it’s invitation on the company despite many attempts to do so.
Speaking at the opening of a two-day public investigative hearing by the committee, it’s chairman Joseph Adeleja said the disappearance petroleum products belonging to the NNPC which were warehoused in Capital Oil’s tank farms, would have had a negative impact on the economy, save for the prompt intervention of the NNPC.
He warned that the Committee would not tolerate time wasting tactics from any of those invited as it has to keep to the schedule given it by the House.
In his presentation, NNPC’s Chief Operating Officer (COO), Downstream, Henry Nkem-Obih said external assistance for the recovery of the money was sought after all internal mechanism to resolve the issue with Capital oil failed.
“The agreement we had clearly state that no party involved in this transaction is authorized to touch each other’s inventory without a written consent of the other party, but in this case no such thing happened.
“Since NNPC is a government agency, the matter was referred to the DSS and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to recover the loss of government asset valued at over N11 billion.