Petroleum products: House queries oil coy over improper account

By Tom Okpe

Ad-Hoc Committee of the House of Representatives investigating oil subsidy payments between 2013 and 2022 has queried Hyde Energy, an oil company that appeared before it over failure to account for petroleum products.

The committee said the oil company and others were shortchanging Nigeria by failing to give account of what becomes of the products which is higher than crude itself.

The lawmakers were apparently shocked when the oil company told them that it exports crude oil for refined petroleum products but failed to account for the products.

Abdulwahab Oseni, Head, Business Development of Hyde Energy, who appeared before the committee at its public hearing on Wednesday, said in the Direct Sale, Direct Purchase (DSDP) contract with the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC), the company does not cover value of the product.

“NNPC in our DSDP contract did not ask us to refine the product. They did not ask us to give them the value of each of the bye-products.

“There is no obligation in the DSDP contract for us to refine petroleum products and as trading company what we do is that, we trade the cargoes and then bring in the products at the time that they asked us to.”

In his intervention, a member of the committee, Siaka Ibrahim called for a closed door investigation so that the invitee can make open, relevant information concerning financial transactions.

The Ibrahim Aliyu-led committee demanded to know the countries the company exports crude to, with a view to ascertaining both the export and import value of crude and refined products,

This, the lawmakers stated will enable the committee write to embassies of the countries in question to uncover details of such transactions.

In his ruling, the chairman, Aliyu urged his colleagues to agree adding; “we have a very good engagement with the Hyde Energy.

“It’s an investigative hearing, you don’t have anything to hide as there is nothing to fear.”

Meanwhile, A-Z Petroleum Products Limited has appealed to the House of Representatives to help it recover an outstanding debt of N30 billion subsidy from the Federal Ministry of Finance.

Hafford Udochukwu, A-Z Petroleum’s Head of Business Development, made the appeal at a public hearing organized by the House ad-hoc Committee investigating the daily consumption of Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) in Nigeria on Wednesday.

Udochukwu said in 2015, the company bought 12 cargos containing 245.89 million liters of PMS, 26.27 million liters in 2017 and 26.64 million liters in 2018.

“We have not been trading on PMS, we are kind of handicapped, severally we have written to the ministry, they have paid others, but we have not been paid, in fact, we went to court two months ago. We are asking the committee to prevail on the Ministry of Finance so that they can pay us the outstanding.

“We have not been paid since 2017, and because of that, we stopped trading in PMS, we are being owed over 30 billion naira by the government for subsidy differentials and because of that we have stopped trading, Udochukwu said.”

Sa’ad-Abdulkadir Abdullahi, chairman of the committee asked the company to provide the lawmakers with all necessary documents and pledged to look into its complaint, directing management of Virgin Forest Energy and Oando to appear before the committee on Monday, August 15, 2022.

He ruled that the companies should appear with proof of payment made and other relevant documents on the quantity of PMS.

The committee also summoned the Managing Director of Ash Group Energy Ltd, a member of the DSGP Contract Consortium which also have Jack Energy Solutions Ltd as member with Vitol AS Ltd as the lead.

The managing director is also, to appear on Tuesday, August 16, 2022 to explain operations and account for the volume of PMS imported.

Abdullahi said the committee will approach NNPC to suspend the operations of the consortium pending the outcome of the hearing.