The Nigerian Senate has raised serious concerns over a staggering ₦210 trillion discrepancy in the audited financial statements of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) covering the years 2017 to 2023.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Public Accounts, Senator Aliyu Wadada, issued a one-week ultimatum to NNPCL, demanding a full explanation and reconciliation of the missing funds.
Responding to the query, NNPCL’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Adedapo Segun, attributed the missing trillions to Joint Venture (JV) cash calls and payments. According to Segun, the amounts—₦103 trillion and ₦107 trillion—are linked to JV operator requests and corresponding payments made by NNPCL that had yet to be reconciled due to incomplete governance procedures at the time.
“The two items will eventually cancel each other out as they represent two sides of the same transaction,” Segun explained. “Because the proper governance processes weren’t completed then, the reconciliation hasn’t been captured in the audited statements.”
However, the CFO’s explanation failed to convince industry experts.
Renowned financial analyst, Habu Sadeik, took to social media platform X (formerly Twitter) to fault the NNPCL’s response, calling it “unsatisfactory” and raising further red flags.
“The CFO’s response is not convincing. Are we now saying cash calls worth hundreds of trillions are only just showing up in the financial statements in 2024 with no prior disclosure?” Sadeik questioned. “Which JV cash call runs into over ₦100 trillion? Something is definitely not right.”
He urged for a retrospective correction of the financial statements, insinuating the possibility of deliberate manipulation. “Someone somewhere did a chef’s work,” he remarked cryptically.
As public scrutiny intensifies, stakeholders and citizens alike await clarity from NNPCL and potential further investigations into what could become one of Nigeria’s largest financial controversies in recent times.
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