Senate Orders NNPCL Auditors 7 Day to Explain N210tr Unreconciled Figures

Senate Public Accounts Committee has issued a one-week ultimatum to external auditors of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) to account for more than N210 trillion in unreconciled figures contained in the company’s audited financial statements.

 

It said that auditors, who certified the accounts, could not evade responsibility for defending them.

 

The committee, chaired by Ibrahim Dankwambo, handed down the directive yesterday after a tense hearing during which lawmakers rejected repeated attempts by the auditors to refer questions back to the NNPCL, insisting that the figures they signed off on must be fully explained.

 

At the heart of the controversy are N107 trillion recorded as receivables and N103 trillion listed as payables in the company’s audited accounts.

 

The lawmakers said the figures remain unexplained because neither the NNPCL nor its auditors had produced schedules identifying the transactions, counterparties or calculations behind them.

 

The auditors, however, informed the committee that the supporting schedules formed part of their working papers and requested about two weeks to retrieve the documents.

 

The request was firmly rejected.

 

Dankwambo questioned why auditors, who had certified the accounts, could not immediately produce documents supporting the figures.

 

When you have figures in audited financial statements, there must be schedules showing exactly how those figures were derived. If those schedules already exist in your working papers, why do you need additional time before presenting them to this committee?” he queried.

 

But the audit firm said that the NNPCL remained its client and that detailed explanations should ordinarily come from the company, recalling that during an earlier hearing, lawmakers had agreed that NNPCL officials would explain the figures.

 

That position drew sharp criticism from the committee.

 

The committee said that NNPCL, being wholly owned by the Federal Government on behalf of Nigerians, could not invoke commercial secrecy to shield information from the Parliament.

 

“NNPCL belongs to the Nigerian people, not to private shareholders. Parliament has every constitutional right to examine its accounts, and no confidentiality agreement can override that responsibility,” a lawmaker said.

 

The auditors were thereafter discharged and directed to reappear before the committee within one week with the requested documentation.