NNPCL: Transparency Group Tackles Senate Over Alleged Missing N210 Trillion

A transparency group has faulted the viral claim that ₦210 trillion vanished from NNPCL between 2017 and 2023, saying the claim doesn’t pass the market-woman test.

In a statement signed by Mr Johnson Momodu for the Fiscal Accountability Committee of Tomorrow, FACT, the group tore into the Senate probe’s headline number, calling it “a category error disguised as a scandal.”

The statement said Nigeria’s 2024 budget was ₦28.7 trillion, arguing that the alleged missing sum is more than seven times the budget.

“In plain language, the allegation suggests one company handled value equal to over seven full years of Nigeria’s total national budget within a seven-year window,” the group said. “Even without a calculator, something should feel off.”

The group argues that the ₦210 trillion was a mashup of liabilities NNPCL owes — JV costs, royalties — and receivables owed to NNPCL, like subsidy claims.

“Adding them together and presenting the total as ‘missing money’ is not a minor error. It is a fundamental misunderstanding, or worse, a convenient distortion,” the statement read.

“If you owe your landlord ₦500,000 and someone else owes you ₦500,000, you are not one million naira poorer. You are balanced, at least on paper.”

The statement said even the Senate admitted that it never said ₦210 trillion was stolen, citing Committee Chairman Senator Wadada. “Once you remove the suggestion of theft, what remains is not a scandal yet. What remains is an accounting question.”

The group asks the senate to publish the full methodology behind the ₦210 trillion figure, separate actual losses from liabilities and receivables, and reveal names of any individual or account where any alleged unlawful payments were made.

“If the answer is No, then what we have is not a financial crime established in fact. What we have is a number in search of meaning,” FACT said.

The group insists it’s not defending anyone, saying “We are a coalition of Nigerian youths, accountants, and citizens who are simply tired of watching public debate collapse under the weight of exaggerated figures that defy common sense.”

The group asks the senate to “show us the math or withdraw the figure.”