Thursday, 20 August 2015

NDDC Diverted N183bn Meant For ND Development - Audit

Auditor general for the federation, Samuel Ukura, claimed on Wednesday, August 19, that at least N183billion meant for the development of Niger Delta was diverted by the officials of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).
The scandalous allegation was posed in a recent report, Premium Times reports. Following which Ukura told those opposing the investigation outcome to defend their position in front of the special government committee.
Three special audit reports showed that the mentioned checks had been conducted for the activities between 2008 and 2012.
“The Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation stands by the Special Periodic Checks on the NDDC and its contents. Any person or corporate organization not satisfied has the opportunity to defend itself before the Public Accounts Committees (PACs) of the National Assembly.”
Reacting to the audit outcome announcement, the NDDC characterized the report as untrue and misleading.
Henry Ogiri, the executive director for finance and administration of the body, was quoted as saying:
“I say without fear of contradiction that the Auditor-General’s report is premature. I say this because we are already putting together the responses to the queries which were directed to a period we were not in the Commission.
“I completely disagree with the Auditor-General on this issue. Some of the claims he made in his report are things that do not hold water as at today. I do not believe that there is any money missing.”
The side which carried out the audit, however, insisted that the condemnation of the report “calculated to demean the efficacy of the Constitutional mandate carried out by the Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation”.
“It is noteworthy to state that it took NDDC 16 months to grant the Office permission to commence the periodic checks beginning from 9th December, 2011 to 6th May, 2013,” the statement said.
“Similarly, it took another 16 months and several reminders to the NDDC with effect from the 24th of April, 2014 to 12th August, 2015 before the final report was submitted to the National Assembly.
“It may interest the reading public to know that at the time of this press release (Wednesday), the NDDC is yet to respond to the special periodic checks.”
Meanwhile the new group managing director of the major oil company in the country, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Ibe . He therefore vowed to be providing the presidency with financial transaction reports on a regular basis starting from this September.



Naij.com

No comments:

Post a Comment