The Chairman of Capital Oil, Dr Ifeanyi Ubah has said the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is owing his company NGN16 billion.
He revealed at public hearing organised by the house of representatives committee on petroleum downstream in Abuja.
The house committee is investigating the alleged disappearance of 82 million metric litres of petrol belonging to NNPC stored at Capital Oil tank farm in Lagos state. Meanwhile the NNPC has also accused Capital Oil of diverting the product.
According to him, the NNPC blew the incident out of proportion.
“The contract which is what we operate with NNPC puts us in a position of a stock manager which is somewhat the vessel akin to an oil bank,” Ifeanyi Ubah said.
“This allows for coming in and loading out of products so long as we ensure that all parties having products in our storage ultimately receive their total stock.
“The NNPC in the past has also borrowed products from us to keep their supply and distribution chain running.
“NNPC claimed that we owe NGN11 billion but failed to reveal that they owe us N16 billion with a key portion of the debt spanning over two years.”
Ubah said although his company acknowledges that it has products belonging to the NNPC in stock, the corporation had failed to conduct a reconciliation with his company “before rushing into making allegations”.
Ubah further bemoaned the sacking of the former Managing Director of NNPC Retail over the alleged diversion incident, insisting that the sack was done in bad faith.
Earlier, the acting Managing Director, NNPC Retail, Danjuma Dansule, said that the total shortfall of petroleum products allegedly diverted by Capital Oil was 82 million metric litres.
Mr. Dansule said that this amounted to N11.144 billion out of which N2 billion part payment had been made as at April.
He, however, said that negotiations were on-going as to the actual value of the alleged diverted product and the interest to be paid by Capital Oil.
He also said that Capital Oil was owing NNPC another N359 million under the Kerosene Direct Scheme.
