Bayo Ojulari, the Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) on Tuesday failed to appear before the Senate Committee on Public Accounts for the fourth time to respond to the audit query raised against the company.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports his non-appearance on a fourth invitation infuriated all the members of the committee, chaired by Senator Aliyu Wadada.
The committee threatened to sanction the GCEO should he refuse to appear before the panel on Wednesday (today) by 3pm.
NAN reports that the committee had earlier sent three invitations to Ojulari to appear before it to explain the N210 trillion unaccounted expenditure as raised in 2017 to 2023 audit report of the Auditor-General for the Federation against the company.
However, at the resumed hearing on Tuesday, when the committee chairman enquired from the Clerk, Mohammed Abdullahi, if the GCEO was around, he responded that he sent a letter explaining his absence.
Ojulari, in the letter dated July 22 and read by the committee’s clerk, claimed that the urgent invitation from President Bola Tinubu at about 1pm on Tuesday prevented him from honouring the committee’s invitation.
Members of the committee, in their separate comments, expressed reservations on the genuineness of the reason given by the GCEO.
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One of the committee members, Senator Victor Umeh, said though a presidential call had reduced his anger against the NNPCL boss, however using President Bola Tinubu as an excuse for failing to appear before the committee should not be allowed to continue.
Senator Joel Thomas Onowakpo accused Ojulari of not taking the invitation of the committee as a priority.
Onowakpo said: “To me, the NNPCL boss thinks that he is bigger than this committee.
“And we don’t need a soothsayer to tell us that he will never honour our invitation except we invoke our powers to compel him.”
Senator Aminu Abbas said the NNPCL boss failed to understand that no GCEO was bigger than the National Assembly.
Abbas said: “For failing to honour invitations of this committee four different times, he should be ordered to appear before the committee tomorrow (Wednesday) unfailingly.”
