$30bn ‘not missing’ from excess crude account

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the coordinating minister of the economy and minister of finance, says $30 billion is not missing from the excess crude account, “as alleged by Adams Oshiomhole”, governor of Edo state.

Speaking when the Association of Enigies from Edo South senatorial district paid him a visit on Wednesday, Oshiomhole had said that “what we have in our excess crude oil account should be over $30 billion but as we speak, we have barely $3 billion in our excess crude account”.

But reacting through Paul Nwabuikwu, her spokesman, Okonjo-Iweala described the governor’s claims as shocking and totally untrue.

“The widely published comment of Adams Oshiomhole alleging that $30 billion is missing from the excess crude account is shocking and totally untrue. The comments reflect, once again, the unfortunate tendency of some political players to politicize the management of the economy on the basis of half-truths and sundry distortions. This is not good for the country. There should be a limit to negative politics even during an election season such as this,” she said.

“Oshiomhole’s sweeping comments give the impression that the federal government sits alone in secret and doles out whatever it wishes to the states from the federation account. But anyone who is familiar with the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) process knows that this is simply not true. The meetings are held every month and commissioners of finance and other officials represent their states and agreements are reached on issues including the sharing of proceeds from the account.

“There is no $30 billion missing from the excess crude account as alleged by Oshiomhole. How can such a huge amount be missing from the ECA and the Edo state governor will be the only one privy to this? It is instructive that the Edo state government did not table this allegation before FAAC for investigation or clarification before going public with a sweeping, political allegation based on casual, back of the envelope calculations.”

She reminded Nigerians that Amaechi had made similar a allegation in the past, but was countered with facts.

“It will be recalled that Amaechi of Rivers state made a similar allegation in November last year when he raised a loud alarm that $5 billion was missing from the same excess crude account. But the federal ministry of finance subsequently showed, with facts, that not only was the money not missing, the Rivers state government got N257.6 billion from the account between January and October 2013. Oshiomhole’s allegation seems to be cut from a similar political fabric.

“Oshiomhole correctly observed that the economy would be in better shape today if we had saved more for the rainy day. But he failed to recall that the federal government’s strong advocacy for a low budget benchmark and greater savings in the ECA, articulated by the coordinating minister, was repulsed by some governors. There is no doubt that oil theft is a challenge but this too would have helped.

“We do not share Oshiomhole’s overly bleak view of the country’s economic prospects. Yes, the challenges are great and cannot be wished away but as Moody’s, the international ratings agency and the IMF confirmed recently, the economy is resilient despite the oil price crash and we retain some advantages as we confront these challenges.”