N3.2 Trillion: AuGF’s Audit Report Erroneous, Says NNPC

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on Wednesday said that the audit report recently submitted to the National Assembly by the office of the Auditor General of the Federation (AuGF) in which it was indicted of not remitting about N3.235 trillion into the government’s coffers are erroneous.

The corporation also said that the report with its alleged errors had the capacity to undermine its current and future business operations. It explained that it was based on this that it decided to put the records straight.

It made the clarification in a statement which was signed by its Group Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Isiaka Abdulrazaq in Abuja.

It noted that even though the claims by the AuGF report were broadly within the 2014 financial year before the current management came on board, it still owed it a duty to safeguard the integrity of the corporation by correcting the office of the AuGF on its alleged accounting errors.

“The Auditor General of the Federation (AuGF) declared to the National Assembly on the 14th of March 2016 that NNPC has failed to remit the sum of N3.235 trillion to the Federation Account for the period ended 31st December 2014.

“NNPC wishes to state in strong terms that the AuGF’s declaration is erroneous. It should also be noted that although this period is before the new NNPC management was appointed in August 2015, the management still deem it fit and important to correct any misinformation about the activities of the corporation as this will adversely affect its current and future financial and operational plans if not corrected,” said Abdulrazaq.

He further stated that since the new management was appointed, it has placed great emphasis on transparency, accountability and integrity and has sought to refocus and reposition the NNPC as demonstrated in the ’20 fixes’ initiatives which it had adopted.

Listing some of the 20 fixes which include: the publication of NNPC monthly financial and operations reports; focus on cost reduction across board an subsequent drop in monthly operational losses from N30 billion in August 2015 to N3 billion in January 2016; as well as, restructuring of NNPC to improve its performance and profitability, Abdulrazaq said that the corporation’s new management has made efforts to identify legacy claims and settle same.

He said that the NNPC in this regards has also undertaken a forensic audit of all the claims and that a report is expected from its appointed forensic auditors soon.

According to him: “Upon the appointment of the new NNPC management, it identified all legacy claims issues between NNPC and the federation and engaged with the Federal Ministry of Finance to resolve the issues by inviting the appointed forensic auditors to conclude the previous forensic audits on these claims and the final report on this is expected soon.”