Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives has ordered management of the Nigeria Ports Authority to immediately engage terminal operators in the nation’s seaports with a view to reconciling the actual indebtedness of the companies to the federal government of Nigeria.
Audit queries from the office of the Auditor General of the Federation had indicted 18 of the terminal operators of owing hundreds of millions both in dollar and naira, part of which the NPA agreed had been paid, but still having substantial sums still pending.
Chairman of the Committee Hon. Wole Oke gave the fresh order during the resumed hearing on the matter on Tuesday, following denial of one of the terminal operators listed by the Nigeria Port Authority (NPA), Tincan Island Container Terminal as being indebted to the Nigerian government to the tune of $4.04m, insisting that it was not owing the government a dime.
Oke said that the Bureau for Public Enterprise and some of the Committee members should be part of the reconciliation meeting, adding that the reconciliation became necessary to out to rest the controversy between the two parties, since there was a total disagreement over the debt as contained in the Report of the Auditor General of the federation.
“I want Nigerians to understand why we invited private companies. Ordinarily, we have no business with private companies. The Auditor General for the Federation indicted terminal operators for being indebted to the Nigeria Port Authority.
“We invited the NPA and they have made their submission and gave us their breakdown of what the terminal operators are owing them and that they tried severally to recover the money. For fair hearing, we have invited you because we cannot shave your hair in your absence”, he said.
General Manager, Finance of the company, Kunle Adigun in his submission said his company was not owing the NPA and government a dime, while accusing the NPA of failing to respond to several letters calling for reconciliation between them. “Several times, we have made several appeals for NPA to come to the table for us to discuss. We have been writing letters since 2015, but no response”, he said.
