The Centre for Social Justice has called for the investigation of the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Dr. Maikanti Baru, over alleged $25 billion contract.
The Lead Director of the center, Eze Onyekpere, disclosed this in a statement issued in Abuja on Wednesday.
Onyekpere said the centre noted with regret the recent allegations by the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, on the way and manner Baru had been running the affairs of the Corporation.
The statement said: “We recall that officers of the previous federal administration who managed the oil sector are facing investigations and trials for offences related to the stealing of Nigeria’s resources.
“Key allegations as revealed by Dr. Ibe Kachikwu include the award of $10 billion crude term contracts; $5 billion direct sales direct purchase contracts; $3 billion AKK pipeline contract; financing allocation funding contracts worth $3billion and NPDC production service contract of $4 billion.
“In all, these contracts worth $25billion were awarded in breach of legal and procurement requirements and the NNPC Board was never involved.
“Again, key management positions were filled without the input of the NNPC Board.”
Onyekpere added that if the legal and procedural requirement was that all contracts above $20 million would need to be reviewed and approved by the board of the NNPC and in over one year of Baru’s tenure no contract had been run through the board, then the procedure was fundamentally flawed.
He said these allegations were weighty and if true constitutes serious crimes and acts of economic sabotage against the Nigerian people and the economy.
He said: “Coming at a time the administration is prosecuting a war against corruption and seeking to enforce due process in the management of national resources, it is imperative that these allegations are thoroughly investigated.
“ If a prima facie case is established, the offender(s) should be prosecuted and the full weight of the law brought to bear on them.”
Onyekpere therefore noted that President Muhammadu Buhari should rise to the occasion in the national interest and ensure that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission investigates these weighty allegations.
He further suggested that the President should consider suspending the alleged official(s) from office to avoid tampering with evidence and sabotaging investigations.
He said: “In the past, many Nigerians have alleged that the federal administration remained silent when serious allegations were made against its key officials.
“It is imperative that the extant allegation is not swept under the carpet. Otherwise, the morality of continued prosecution of persons accused of lesser economic and financial crimes will become a subject for serious questioning.”
Onyekpere said Nigeria had only one set of laws and it should apply across board in accordance with the tenets of justice, which demands equality before the law, equal protection of the law and treating like cases alike.
“We hope that law enforcement and investigation agencies would live up to the demands of their statutory and constitutional mandates,” he added.