By Abubakar Yunusa
The National Civil Society Council of Nigeria (NCSCN) has condemned the allegations made by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) against the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL).
SERAP recently leveled an allegation against the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited over failure to account for and explain the whereabouts of alleged missing $2.04 billion and N164 billion oil revenues.
SERAP, in a statement signed by the Deputy Director of SERAP, Kolawole Oluwadare, in the recently published 2020 audited report by the Auditor-General of the Federation that the NNPC failed to remit the alleged money into the Federation Account, claiming that the money may have been diverted to unknown destinations.
At a press conference in Abuja yesterday, the Executive Director of the CSOs, Blessing A. Akinlosotu, explained that we make bold to assert, without fear of contradictions or condemnations, that almost all the allegations leveled against the management of the NNPCL so far are unfounded and misrepresentations of facts and figures.
He noted that despite the fact that no public institution in Nigeria today can be absolutely exonerated or given a 100% clean bill of health forensically in terms of corruption and bad eggs.
Mr. Blessings said the Council perceives a deliberate plot in some quarters that are both politically and economically motivated to frustrate the ongoing reforms in the Petroleum Industry in Nigeria and transformation in the NNPCL.
“Some of these detractors are internal forces of economic saboteurs, while others are high-level international business actors that have hitherto taken undue advantages of the country’s previous weak laws and naïve policies in the Petroleum Industry.
“Some mischief makers, especially within the Media Sector and Civil Society Community, have taken advantage of the negative past records and maladministration in the defunct Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to continuously smear the image and blackmail the current management of the NNPCL that is determined to salvage our Petroleum Industry.
“These detractors and saboteurs probably have the ultimate aim of casting aspersions at the government of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Meanwhile, the leadership of NCSCN sympathizes with the management of the NNPCL on their unenviable and herculean task of reforming and rebranding a battered organizational image of the former NNPC to a desirous and acceptable bride.
We call on the operators of the Media Industry to eschew unnecessary sensationalism, instead to deploy more professionalism in carrying out their highly sensitive and sacred responsibility of information dissemination.
The Media should not be a weapon of blackmail or vendetta but should serve as eyes and ears of the Society, playing a complementary role in National Development. Investigative journalism should be the mindset, while patriotism is the keyword.
NNPCL must work assiduously to purge itself of any corrupt tendencies and bad eggs, thus living above board at all times. If the system is now truly rebirthed as we believe it to be, then transparency and accountability must be sustained as hallmarks without compromise at any point.
We hope to have all our 500 existing affiliates at the proposed 1st National Civil Society Conversation on the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) and NNPCL.
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