Saraki and The Missing $20bn Issue

Before President Muhammadu Buhari travelled to the United States on a four-day official trip, one of the issues dominating the national discourse was the missing $20 billion money in the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC). The issue was first raised by former CBN governor, now Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi.

However, one senator felt sufficiently peeved that the nation was losing so much resource, which could have been used for the benefit of the masses. Thus, he took up the issue of the leakages in the nation’s oil receipts and moved a powerful motion on the floor of the Seventh Senate. That senator is now the head of the upper legislative chamber – Dr Bukola Saraki.

At that time, the seventh Senate set up a committee to probe allegations that the nation lost $20 billion due to sharp practices in the sector. The report of the committee led by former Kaduna State governor, Senator Ahmed Makarfi, turned to be as controversial as the amount of money said to have been lost. While the committee in an anti-climatic manner failed to directly identify how much was lost and who benefitted from the loss, Saraki refused to sign the report of the investigation into the alleged non-remittance of $20bn by NNPC into the federation account. In his letter dated 3rd of June 2014 to the committee to explain why he withheld his signature, he wrote: “It is my opinion that this report as laid has not fully addressed the matter referred to us adequately and conclusively. The report has not been definitive on its findings and has failed to address some of the critical issues I had raised during our meetings. For this reason; I am withholding my support and signature.”

The records of the committee are still accessible in the National Assembly and can be verified. The senator chose to stand by the people, thereby breaking ranks with his colleagues.

Also, it is still on record that Senator Saraki is the only senator in the committee that refused to sign the report even in the face of severe duress and personal inconvenience. Sen. Saraki, during the investigation, was known to have been very probing with his questions, meticulously reviewing the data offered by NNPC, in order to get to the bottom of the issue. It would be recalled that though he did not make the last meeting of the committee, when the news broke that the committee had cleared the NNPC, he was the first and the only senator to rebut the report saying, “the recent media reports claiming that the Senate Committee on Finance has cleared NNPC of any unaccounted revenue funds are not true… I have been very active in the investigation, nothing significant has changed to suggest clearing of anyone”. See Thisday Newspapers of May 29, 2014.

by Bamikole Omishore

Omishore is Special Assistant on New Media to Senate President