The Federal Government has recovered N600bn from oil and gas companies operating in Nigeria.
The refund comprised unpaid taxes, royalties, penalties, and commission on rentals that were identified in the audit report of the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative.
Based on figures captured in the audit report of NEITI, it was shown that the total liabilities of the 77 oil firms that were involved as of 2019 was N2.6tn.
The House of Representatives invited the firms in a bid to recover the funds and it was gathered that after the intervention by the lawmakers, the companies commenced the process of remitting some of the funds.
Documents obtained by our correspondent in Abuja on Friday indicated that while the total recovery pre-2021 and before the pronouncement of NEITI was N900bn, the additional amount recovered after NEITI’s pronouncement/National Assembly review was N600bn.
Speaking to select journalists on the development in Abuja on Friday, the Executive Secretary, NEITI, Orji Ogbonnaya-Orji, said, “The 2021 (oil and gas sector) report will be concluded and published before the end of the year. The scope of the report is to establish what companies paid to the government within the given year 2021 and how much of that money the government received.
“We equally want to establish if those companies paid what they should pay and if the government received what it should receive, as well as the variances if any.
“We want to establish the quantity of crude that is produced, how much of that can be accounted for, and how much was stolen. We should establish the amount that was exported, reserved for local consumption, and how this reserve one managed.”
