By Christiana Ekpa
Senate yesterday resolved to probe alleged corruption in the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) amounting to $137 million.
This was sequel to a point of order raised by Sen. Dino Melaye (APC-Kogi) during plenary on Tuesday.
He said “While some individuals and government appointees will continue to steal, we have decided to continue to expose corruption in public life.
“I call the attention of the Nigerian Senate to a suspected, colossal, monumental corruption in NNPC.
“A company was registered with the name ‘Brass LNG Limited’ with the Federal Government having controlling shares. We have some Italians, Belgians and French as shareholders, with the Federal Government with a controlling share of about 50 per cent.
He said it was a known fact that once you had a joint venture, the account of such joint venture would be domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), stressing that, the case was not what happened.
“In private, the account was opened with Keystone Bank; this account has no BVN and there has been periodic withdrawals (from it). The last withdrawal from the account was to the tune of $4m. As I speak to you, the balance of that account as of today is $137m.”
After a voice vote by the President of the Senate Dr Bukola Saraki the lawmakers resolved to look into the issue in another legislative day.
