The Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream) will on Thursday grill stakeholders in the Petroleum sector on subsidy payment allegedly being paid to some individuals and corporate bodies through the back door.
Specifically, the Senate panel has picked holes in claims by Petroleum marketers and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr. Maikanti Baru, that the landing cost for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) is N171 while domestic pump price for the product is N145.
Briefing journalists at the National Assembly on Friday, the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Petroleum (Downstream), Senator Kabiru Marafa, raised questions on who pays the difference of N26 if the landing cost of PMS is N171 and the pump price is N145.
Marafa said there are indications that a subsidy of N26 is being paid on every litre of petrol sold in the country and wondered who has been paying the subsidy.
He said: “If there is subsidy payment, then who approved it and how much has been paid out as subsidy so far. If you want to provide subsidy, it should come through the National Assembly but we have not receive any request for subsidy payment from the Executive arm.
Stating that about N10 trillion has been paid out as subsidy, Marafa lamented that stakeholders in the Petroleum industry, particularly the NNPC, have not been transparent in the running of the sector.
He said these are some of the issues the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, Baru and others would be made to explain to Nigerians at the January 4 hearing.
“We are going back to the same circle where only a few persons benefit from subsidy payment at the expense of the Nigerian people,” the senator said.
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