Reps probe NNPC joint venture proceeds

THE House of Representatives, on Thursday, directed its committee on petroleum resources (upstream) to investigate the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Joint Venture Agreements (JVA) so as to block revenue leakages and report back to the House within seven weeks.

The House committee was also asked to carry out a forensic review of the NNPC joint venture books to establish the amount of income tax that had accrued to joint venture partners in the past seven years and the amount remitted to the Federation Account.

The House’s resolution was sequel to a motion moved by Honourable Ossai Ossai, entitled, "recovery of revenue accruable to the Federation Account from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its joint venture partners."

Leading debate on the motion, Honourable Ossai said that "the Joint Operating Agreements (JOA) largely favoured the operator-companies to the detriment of the non-operator, NNPC."

This development, he said, had continued to happen despite the fact that the NNPC and the oil companies were expected to fund the joint venture operations, stressing that income from sale of assets, marine transportation, haulage or pipeline transportation, which formed part of the Joint Venture Operations, were unaccounted for.

On the joint venture income with the NNPC, he noted that "these sources of the joint venture income amounted to billions of naira or dollars, particularly haulage or pipeline transportation as the case may be."

He said that the companies under the joint venture agreements netted the huge income against expenses already settled with the collusion of NNPC to avoid remittance to the Federation Account, maintaining that,"besides the lifting of oil in agreed sharing ratio, there are associated benefits or revenues in line with their interest holdings as contained in the JVA."

The motion was unanimously supported by the lawmakers when the Deputy Speaker, Honourable Emeka Ihedioha put the motion to vote.Daily Jokes | Free Forex Signals | Ibadan City Network (Forum) | Small Business Guide