TheCable

The house of representatives has summoned the auditor-general for the federation to provide evidence of an audit on the payments of fuel subsidy between 2013 and 2022.

Ibrahim Aliyu, chairman, special ad hoc committee investigating the fuel subsidy, issued the notice on Thursday, during the scrutiny of documents submitted by Mohammed Saleh, director, federation accounts and the representative of the accountant-general, in Abuja.

Mark Gbillah, a member of the committee, after thoroughly scrutinising the documents, identified some discrepancies in the amount computed in the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) documents.

The committee asked the auditor-general to provide documentary evidence on the audit carried out on the monies spent on fuel subsidies by NNPC Limited.

It also demanded relevant financial transactions on the fuel subsidy for the period under review, citing a bid to ensure a fair hearing as enshrined in the law.

The committee said it was expecting the auditor-general to appear before it on September 8th, with relevant documents and also expressed the need to ensure due diligence by verifying the transaction documents submitted by all government agencies in line with its functions.

In a report by SBM Intelligence, a geopolitical research firm, the costs of petrol subsidy in Nigeria increased by 890 percent over five years (2017-2021) even though petrol prices only increased by 12.1 percent.

In the first half of 2022, petrol subsidy claims amounted to N2.6 trillion — a figure above crude oil sale receipts from the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited.