29th May, 2014
Senator Bukola Saraki, a member of the Senate Committee on Finance on Wednesday described as misleading, reports indicating that the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs Deziani Alison-Madueke and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) have been cleared of allegations of missing funds levelled against them by suspended Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Lamido Sanusi.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, Saraki noted that the committee is yet to conclude its work as it is waiting to receive the forensic audit and independent anaysis report from those it saddled with the task.
The Chairman of the Finance Committee and former Governor of Kaduna State, Ahmed Markarfi, had while presenting the report at plenary said the Committee could not establish any missing money as alleged by the suspended Governor of the CBN, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.
“The recent media reports claiming that the Senate Committee on Finance has cleared NNPC of any unaccounted revenue fund is not true.
“Though I could not attend the last meeting of the committee, I have been very active in the investigation. Nothing significant has changed to suggest clearing anybody.
“I can say on behalf of the Committee that these media reports bear no correlation to the content of the Senate Committee report and I would urge the public to disregard it in its entirety.
“The Committee is yet to receive the report on the forensic audit and independent analysis on the subject clearly indicates we have a lot of grounds to cover in order to determine the level of culpability or otherwise of agency on the alleged non-committal, so to suggest any clearance for anybody at this stage is out of the question.
“I will further advise that the media should wait for the senate to release the details of the Committee report to the public before they jump into spurious conclusion,” Saraki stated.