It's false, we did not accuse NUPRC of N32bn fraud

The Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives on Monday clarified that, contrary to reports, it has not accused the Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, NUPRC, of involvement in a N32 billion revenue leak scandal or failure to comply with Treasury Single Account protocols.

A statement released by the Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, Bamidele Salam, on Monday said that the matter was addressed on Monday, November 4, during a hearing on the Auditor-General’s report before the committee.

In the statement, Bamidele noted that the committee’s focus is on safeguarding public interests, particularly in terms of revenue generation, and stressed that the committee had not made any allegations of financial misconduct against the NUPRC.

“We have not said or accused NUPRC of revenue leakage as reported by the media. We cannot control their narrative, but I don’t know where they got it from,” Bamidele stated, asserting that the committee conducts thorough scrutiny and does not issue conclusions without extensive evaluation.

Recent media reports claimed that the Committee on Public Accounts had identified a N32.151 billion revenue leak in the NUPRC’s revenue records for the Federal Government between 2015 and 2022.

The reports also alleged that the committee had found approximately N909.3 million transferred directly to private accounts within deposit money banks without adherence to TSA protocols.

Additionally, the reports suggested discrepancies, specifically citing N15.4 billion in Remita-listed transactions and N6.3 billion in transactions from NUPRC data that were reportedly absent from Remita.

However, Bamidele affirmed that the NUPRC is a critical agency for the country and reiterated that the committee refrains from issuing judgments on sensitive revenue matters without a comprehensive review.

In his response, NUPRC Chief Executive Gbenga Komolafe assured the committee of the commission’s adherence to the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) of 2021, a mandate that guides its operations. He expressed confidence in the NUPRC’s records, stating that all necessary documents had been provided to the committee to counter the allegations.

“The NUPRC highlighted that it had not initially been given adequate time to address the Auditor-General’s report but later presented a detailed report to the committee, which contained evidence showing that any unremitted sums stemmed from specific funding arrangements—Modified Carry Agreements (MCA) and Direct Sale Direct Purchase (DSDP) agreements with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL).

“These funds had been delayed due to the scheduling of cargo loadings, but the NUPRC provided communication records with the NNPCL requesting the payments, along with account statements from the Accountant-General’s JP Morgan account to confirm the payment history.

“Regarding the allegations of TSA protocol violations and discrepancies in Remita data, the NUPRC clarified that the reported figures originated directly from the Remita platform.

“The detailed transactions reported to the committee were generated from the Remita platform,” the NUPRC stated, adding that its collections through Remita are managed by an Enterprise Automated Portal, largely composed of legacy systems inherited from the now-defunct Department of Petroleum Resources.