By Kingsley Omose
The so-called activists behind #EndBadGovernance are politically motivated and seek a route to power by other means other than through the four year ritual of what is called elections in Nigeria.
These #EndBadGovernance protesters have no true desire to end bad governance. Otherwise, they would be up in protests at the three towers of NNPC Ltd following the release of its 2023 financial reports.
The revelation that in 2023, NNPC Ltd spent N25 trillion to keep its loss making subsidiaries afloat, a sum N4 trillion more than FG’s N21 trillion 2023 Budget is the true picture of bad governance.
NNPC Ltd also spent N583 billion on 5710 employees as emoluments, N182 billion on legal costs, and more as part of the N2.9 trillion spent on General & Admin expenses for 2023.
All these spending by NNPC Ltd came as first line charge mostly from crude oil sales proceeds deducted before these funds hit the Federation Account as required by the Nigerian constitution.
This clearly means that NNPC Ltd has a first line charge on proceeds coming from the sale of resources belonging to the Nigerian state over and above the 1999 Constitution and taking precedence over the Nigerian people.
If NNPC Ltd were involved in actual crude oil and gas production in the Joint Ventures and Production Sharing Contracts, a responsibility undertaken by its partners, maybe Nigerians could have deluded themselves that it is a value adding entity.
If NNPC Ltd were involved in actual crude oil refinining and production of petroleum products using its own refineries, maybe Nigerians could have deluded themselves that it is a value adding entity in the downstream oil and gas sector.
Rather, this entity with moribund refineries and completely dysfunctional petrol depots that encourage distribution of petroleum products by road engages in the importation of substandard products costing over N7 trillion and from which it makes exponential profits.
And yet NNPC Ltd has the temerity to employ the services of a company to prevent pipeline vandals and thieves from tapping into pipelines so that it can enhance its utilisation of the same crude oil for meeting its own contrived purposes.
NNPC Ltd, by its 2023 financial report, is the ultimate pipeline vandal and thief of oil and gas resources belonging to the Nigerian state and by law held on behalf of the Nigerian people.
This is the same story with the other Ministries Departments and Agencies of the Federal Government numbering over 1000, especially the ones that monies belonging to the government pass through like NNPC Ltd.
The difference between NNPC Ltd and these other 1000 MDAs is that it gets to vandalize and thieve from the pipeline of state resources before the proceeds enter the Federation Account, making NNPC Ltd the first son of the Nigerian state.
NNPC Ltd ranks above the FG and it’s other MDAs, ranks above the 36 States and their own MDAs, and the 774 Local Councils who all feed from the pipeline of state resources post the Federation Account, you just have to look at their recurrent expenditures.
The dismantling of NNPC Ltd has to be used as a poster for child for all these artificial entities that are called MDAs whether at Federal, State or LG level, that were supposedly created to further the wellbeing and welfare of the Nigerian people, that Nigerians are the real national assets of the country.
Kingsley Omose is a public analyst.
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