The Nigerian federal government says it plans to commence a fresh audit of the N2.8 trillion fuel subsidy claim by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited.
This plan was disclosed during the Federal Account Allocation Committee meeting held in March 2024; a copy was recently released to journalists.
The development comes after an audit firm, KPMG, conducted an initial audit, which slashed the claims from N6 trillion to N2.7 trillion.
To achieve this, the government is considering either engaging an external audit firm or directing the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation to verify the claims made by the corporation regarding the amount the government owes to it.
Recall that on May 30, 2023, a few hours after the famous “subsidy is gone” declaration by President Bola Tinubu, the NNPCL Group Chief Executive Officer, Mele Kyari, told State House correspondents that the federal government still owes the firm the sum of N2.8 trillion spent on petrol subsidies.
Kyari said NNPCL took care of the fuel subsidy bill for the government, but the government has so far been unable to pay back the N2.8 trillion.
He said, “Since the provision of N6 trillion in 2022 and N3.7 trillion in 2023, we have not received any payment whatsoever from the Federation.
“That means they (the Federal Government) cannot pay, and we’ve continued to support this subsidy based on the cash flow of the NNPC.
“We are waiting for them to settle up to N2.8tn of NNPC’s cash flow from the subsidy regime, and we can’t continue to build this.”
But giving an update on the issue during the FAAC meeting, the Minister of Finance and Chairman of the committee, Wale Edun, said Tinubu was committed to ensuring that the forensic audit of NNPC Limited was conducted and the results analysed.
The Chairman informed the members of Mr. President’s commitment to ensuring that the forensic audit of NNPC Limited was conducted.
He, however, proposed that since the Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation had expertise in auditing, the Office would be considered first before any other external audit firm.
He added that where external support would be required, an independent firm could be engaged accordingly.