SAN FRANCISCO, August 21, (THEWILL) – The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) says it has recovered N329.150billion from 10 oil marketers from 2016 to date.
This was contained in a report by the Petroleum Products and Marketing Company (PPMC) to the EFCC Acting Chairman, Ibrahim Magu, following investigations by a special task force set up by Magu.
The PPMC had written a petition to the EFCC, against some oil marketers who defaulted in payment for products supplied to them by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) through the PPMC, seeking help to recover the funds.
Magu then raised a special task force, which was managed by the EFCC Zonal office in Kano, to investigate how the marketers incurred the debts to the tune of about N349, 818,411,556.37.
After the reconciliation, the Task Force in its report said it recovered the sum of N329.150bn from 10 marketers while N20, 604, 109, 123.90 is yet to be recovered.
“Further to our previous correspondence to your office in respect of the above subject matter, please note that till date, the debts recovered from major oil marketers include N87, 028, 851, 268.17 and N242, 121, 256,468.03 for legacy and current debts respectively, leaving a balance of N20, 604, 109, 123.90 broken down into N4, 426,439, 240(legacy debts) and N16, 177,669, 883.90(current debts),” the report, signed by Umar Ajiya, read in part.
“These amounts have been agreed with the marketers that they shall be deducted and paid from outstanding entitlements or payments due to the marketers from the Federal Ministry of Finance and which will bring to the end the debt recovery effort.
“We wish to express our profound gratitude for the successful collaboration between the EFCC and PPMC/ NNPC which largely resulted in the huge recovery of debt from the marketers from the inception of the recovery exercise in 2016 to date.”
Also, the Head of Media and Publicity of EFCC, Wilson Uwujaren, gave insight into the breakthrough by EFCC detectives.
“Findings by the operatives of the EFCC revealed that the oil marketers were actually indebted to the Federal Government to the tune of N91,519,485,204.44bn between 2010 and 2016,” he stated.
“Further investigation into the allegation also revealed that the oil marketers had continued to obtain petroleum products from the government without proper payment, in violation of the NNPC/PPMC credit facility regulations.
“Upon the conclusion of the preliminary investigation, officials of NNPC/PPMC and all the managing directors of the concerned companies which are NNPC retails, Conoil Plc, Total Plc, OVH Energy Plc, Oando Plc, Forte Oil and Gas Plc, Mobil Plc, MRS Oil Plc, and NIPCO Oil Plc were invited to the Kano Zonal Office of the Commission where their statements were recorded following which the recovery process commenced.”
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