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Again, Reps demand revenue details from NNPC, others

By on June 6, 2014

The House of Representatives on Thursday asked the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation to submit the details of revenue performance from 2011 till date to its Committee on Finance.

It also ordered an investigation into the “true state of the nation’s economy” within six weeks.

Other agencies directed to produce their revenue details were Federal Inland Revenue Service, Nigerian Customs Service, Department of Petroleum Resources and the Budget Office of the Federation.

The resolution of the House followed a motion moved by a Peoples Democratic Party lawmaker from Taraba State, Mr. Ibrahim El-Sudi‎.

Our correspondent recalls that in December last year, the House had opened a similar probe of the economy by raising 50 questions for the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to answer.

The minister had replied the House, dismissing most of the questions to the amazement of lawmakers.

A scheduled public hearing on the state of the economy in February was later stalled, as Okonjo-Iweala and the Committee on Finance resorted to a media war.

The hearing was eventually stalled before El-Sudi came up with a fresh motion on Thursday to revisit it.

El-Sudi had argued that it was important to ascertain the state of the economy because poverty, unemployment and deprivation were high in the country in spite of its latest rating as Africa’s leading economy.

He also observed that amid a steady rise in the global price of crude oil, the country had consistently run a deficit budget with a combined domestic and foreign debt burden of $65.2billion.

The lawmaker spoke further, “Nigeria’s debt profile has gradually started rising with the country’s external debt (federal and states) standing at $9.1bn and Nigeria’s total debt burden, including all domestic debts, rising to N10.32trillion ($65.2bn) according to the Debt Management Office.

“The House is aware that not only is the debt over-hang on Nigeria increasing, the domestic debt and the excruciating cost of servicing same, is really hurting the economy.

“About N2tn had been spent between 2011 and 2013 in servicing domestic debt and a whooping N712bn budgeted to service same in 2014, at an interest rate said to be the highest in the world.

“The House is concerned that the share of recurrent ‎expenditure in the budget was only marginally reduced from 74 per cent in 2011 to 71 per cent in 2012 and to 68 per cent in 2013 and has now risen to 76.3 per cent in 2014.

“Withdrawal from the Excess Crude Account to pay for petroleum subsidy claims, which increased sharply in recent years from N291bn in 2007 to about N2.188tn in 2011 and the 2012‎ and 2013 subsidy claims have more or less averaged over N1tn.”

In another resolution, the House directed its Committee on Works to liaise with the Ministry of Works with a “view to reviving the weigh-bridges” and installing new ones on highways ‎in the country.

 

[Punch]