It is illegal to appoint Tinubu as the Petroleum Minister — Falana

President Bola Tinubu has been urged to cease presenting himself as the Minister of Petroleum by Femi Falana, a human rights attorney and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN). Falana points out that the President was not subjected to Senate Screening, as required by the Constitution.

This was said by the feisty attorney during her keynote speech at the book launch for “Dis Life No Balance: An Anthology of Diasporan Nigerian Voices,” which was written by Dr. Osmund Agbo, Professor Moses Ochonu, and Professor Farooq Kperogi.

Falana stated that the nation finds it challenging to hold the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation Limited (NNPCL) responsible as the President serves as the Minister of Petroleum.

Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, a former governor of the Central Bank, counselled President Bola Tinubu last week not to take the position of minister of petroleum resources because it would be challenging for the nation to hold the NNPCL responsible for its actions.

Additionally, he stated that we must address the core issues of why there is no money coming in and stabilise the currency rate. Why can’t the NNPCL generate revenue? The money are missing. The Finance Minister is unable to inform us of the quantity of petrol barrels we manufacture and export as he lacks the monitoring system that provides information to him.

“The Ministry wants to know how much oil we produce in a day, and only the NNPCL can provide the data.

“We paid N11 trillion for fuel imports over the course of eight years under President Muhammadu Buhari; why is there not an investigation into this enormous amount of money? And with that, let me say this: President Bola Tinubu is not the Minister of Petroleum Resources because the Senate never received his nomination for screening, as required by Section 147 of the Constitution.

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“My recommendation is that the President, like President Olusegun Obasanjo and President Muhammadu Buhari, should not portray himself as the minister of petroleum,” he stated.

In addition to his request that the NNPCL disclose Nigeria’s daily oil and gas earnings, he said that on April 27, 2019, the Senate committee on Public Accounts held a public hearing in the National Assembly Complex to investigate the country’s LNG earnings. During the hearing, a representative of the LNG company stated that Nigeria received dividend payments totaling $18 billion between 2004 and 2020.

Falana claimed the woman also disclosed that, from 2011 and the present, the LNG has paid $9 billion in taxes, with a further $15 billion going to the NNPCL.

According to him, the Senate requested the Accountant General of the Federation to prepare a report on the LNG’s disclosure; however, the report has not yet been made available to the public.

“This audience might find it interesting to know that the NNPCL received $2.2 billion from LNG in 2020, 2021, and 2022. Since this money was intended for the Federation Account, the NNPCL is unlawfully withholding $35.3 billion from the Federation Account as a whole,” the attorney stated.

Furthermore, he said that the Federal Government of Nigeria was ordered to recover from six oil companies royalties that had been uncollected for eighteen years due to sabotage of the law’s implementation by the Supreme Court in 2018, in response to a ruling in a case brought by three states: Akwa Ibom, Rivers, and Bayelsa State.

He claimed that in order to determine the amount owing, the Federal Government hired some accountants, and they arrived at a number of $62 billion.

“There are $62 billion and $35 billion in question. Should the Federal Government muster the guts to retrieve a significant portion of this money, our nation won’t be in this predicament where we are constantly requesting loans from the IMF, World Bank, and other institutions,” he continued.

Senators Aminu Tambuwal, a former governor of Sokoto, Seriake Dickson, a former governor of Bayelsa State, Douye Diri, a former presidential candidate, Omoyele Sowore, and Bayo Ononuga, a presidential aide, all contributed to the book launch.