Over 40 oil firms are expected to be invited by the Senate adhoc committee set up to investigate the allegations in the feud between the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Ibe Kachikwu, and the Group Managing Director, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Maikanti Baru.
Kachikwu in a leaked memo to President Muhammadu Buhari had alleged that against the rules, Baru awarded major contracts worth $25bn without reviewing or discussing them with him or the NNPC board.
“The legal and procedural requirements are that all contracts above $20m would need to be reviewed and approved by the board of NNPC. Mr. President, in over one year of Mr Baru’s tenure, no contract has been run through the board.
‘‘As in many cases of things that happen in NNPC these days, I learn of transactions only through publications in the media,’’ Kachikwu wrote.
It was gathered that the Senate, which had earlier stated that it would probe the allegations, decided to invite over 40 companies which received the following contracts: Crude Term contracts — valued over $10bn; the Direct Sale of Crude Oil and Direct Purchase of Petroleum Product (DSDP contract) valued over $5bn; the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano gas pipeline contract valued at $3bn; allocation of funding contracts of national oil companies valued over $3bn and NPDC production service contracts valued between $3bn and $4bn..
Associates of both men within the government appeared to be reluctant to speak on record because of Buharis’s intervention in the raging feud.
“The legal and procedural requirements are that all contracts above $20m would need to be reviewed and approved by the board of NNPC. Mr. President, in over one year of Mr Baru’s tenure, no contract has been run through the board.
‘‘As in many cases of things that happen in NNPC these days, I learn of transactions only through publications in the media,’’ Kachikwu wrote.
It was gathered that the Senate, which had earlier stated that it would probe the allegations, decided to invite over 40 companies which received the following contracts: Crude Term contracts — valued over $10bn; the Direct Sale of Crude Oil and Direct Purchase of Petroleum Product (DSDP contract) valued over $5bn; the Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano gas pipeline contract valued at $3bn; allocation of funding contracts of national oil companies valued over $3bn and NPDC production service contracts valued between $3bn and $4bn..
Associates of both men within the government appeared to be reluctant to speak on record because of Buharis’s intervention in the raging feud.
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