Daily Independent (Lagos)
8 January 2009
editorial
Like a bad dream, the revelation by the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), empowered by the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, to "monitor the accruals to and disbursements of revenue from the Federation Account," that Nigeria got more than N3l trillion from its revenue sources in the past nine years out of which the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has retained N6 trillion, is mind-boggling. Given the absence of any meaningful or visible developmental strides by Government in the past nine years of democratic governance, the revelation speaks volumes about the peculiar style of leadership and policy initiation which the Federal Government has chosen to boldly subscribe to, and which the citizenry have had cause to bitterly complain about.
It shows that there is indeed a curious twist of irony in the much trumpeted anti-corruption war initiated by the last Olusegun Obasanjo-led Administration. It is obvious that government in Nigeria constitutes a fertile ground in which the mushrooms of capital corruption grow. In a paper made available recently in Abuja by the RMAFC, the commission listed the major sources of revenue into the Federation Account to include the NNPC, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), and the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR). The commission stated that the NNPC realised N17,597,60l,536,673.70 through export crude sales, domestic crude sales, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), and Liquefied Natural Gas. Yet, after deductions (and or transfer to Excess Revenue Account) of N11,050,946,764,372.80, the NNPC retained the difference.
It would be recalled that in November 2005, the National Economic Intelligence Committee (NEIC), headed by Professor Ibrahim Ayagi, in its 2005 Second Quarter Report disclosed that N17.62 billion belonging to the Federation Account, was not remitted to it by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and the collecting banks of the FIRS. Professor Ayagi's committee report also disclosed that while a total sum of N6.6 billion in the CBN accounts was yet to be recorded in the books of the revenue collecting agents, the NNPC, which bought crude oil for local consumption at prevailing international prices and exchange rate of dollars to the Naira, was unwilling to pay the sum of N122.38 billion due to the Federal Government. It is therefore obvious that these distortions have been cumulative and a pointer to the fact that there is no credible accounting system in application at the Federal level and a manifest lack of transparency in the system.
No doubt, Nigerians will welcome the RMAFC report with cautious indignation, given the apparent rascality and unbridled exuberance with which the commission supported the astronomical hike of salaries and entitlements of political office-holders in the country after similar alarm over distortions in the Federation Account. We hope that the commission itself is not entangled in the mess while fuelling frivolous speculations in the system. But the report by itself is an indictment of the Federal Government vis-+-vis the NNPC and a proof of a terrible flaw in the management of the national economy. There is a staggering discrepancy between what Government earns and monies accounted for. It is most unfortunate that Nigeria once again found itself in such a sorry pass, which can only be blamed on what is clearly a failure of leadership on the part of the Obasanjo Administration.
What is even more painful and regrettable is the fact that in spite of the deception, which the Government infused into its war on corruption, the Obasanjo Administration actively promoted corruption in this country. Most reprehensible and callous is the painful fact that budgets were not implemented. In several cases, the necessary feasibility studies which government must undertake before financing any projects are perfunctorily done and this implies that it deliberately budgeted for some white elephant projects. While it is conceded that the capitalist opinion to national development is an incentive to corruption, the view must be maintained that the incompetent and misguided attempts at importing economic policies that have proven to be failures elsewhere have been an additional impetus to the rogue instinct of our governing elite.
While a break with the tardiness of the past must be seen to be the goal of the Umaru Yar' Adua Administration, it has to be pointed out that equally important is the removal of the time lag between policy pronouncement and its implementation. One of the crucial destabilising factors in this game is the refusal of government to release capital vote on time. As for the NNPC, we call for a judicial commission of inquiry to investigate its activities in the past ten years if only to convince Nigerians that the corporation does not exist as a conduit to siphon oil revenue unto private pockets. In fact, the accounts of all federal ministries, departments and agencies since 1999 should be subjected to thorough audit.
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