President Bola Ahmed Tinubu should not be Nigeria’s Petroleum Minister, a former Emir of Kano state, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi has said.
The president had only appointed Heineken Lokpobiri Minister of State for the ministry amidst speculation that he had appointed himself Minister of Petroleum.
The former emir who called for the probe of the Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL commented on Thursday in Abuja while delivering his remarks at the Bank Directors Summit organised by the Bank Directors Association of Nigeria.
He described the Mele Kyari-led oil company as the most ‘opaque’ company in the world, saying its account must be audited due to its failure to remit necessary funds into the coffers of the federal government.
According to him, the country will not be experiencing Dollar scarcity if the NNPC has remitted adequate revenue from oil sales to the federal government.
NNPC must be made accountable, he said.
Sanusi: “Why is the NNPCL not able to bring in dollars? Am sorry this is the question that cost me my job and I will continue asking this question until NNPCL fixes it up or until I die. Where are the dollars? We need to shine a light on the NNPCL. The finance minister cannot tell you because he doesn’t have a monitoring system that reports to him. The finance minister can’t tell you how many barrels of petrol we produce and export. It is only the NNPCL that can give those figures. The finance ministry needs to know how much oil we produce daily, how much we sell, and where the money is going.
“We are no longer paying subsidies so where are the dollars? It was under recovery during the subsidy era and that has been stopped, so where is the money? This was the issue I raised for which I was suspended, well you can suspend me again. The NNPCL is the most opaque oil company in the world. When I was in the central bank for 15 years, they had not been audited. We have to follow the money from production to export to return, where is the money going? We paid N11tn in subsidy and there is no accountability up till now. The National Assembly called the NNPCL to bring the documents, but they refused.
He added, “By the way, let me advise that the idea of the President becoming a petroleum minister is not a good idea. The last president was the minister of petroleum for eight years. When I was governor of the central bank we had a minister of petroleum so when I talk about the NNPCL, I could attack Diezani Madueke. Now, nobody can talk about petroleum because for eight years if you talk, you are attacking the president. We need that buffer, somebody has to be there, so a minister has to be there who is held accountable by Nigerians.”
President Tinubu predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari made himself Minister of Petroleum during his eight years in office amidst criticism from not a few Nigerians who described the action inappropriate.
