By Jemimah Wellington, JKNewsMedia Correspondent
Tensions escalated in the Senate on Tuesday as Bayo Ojulari, Group Chief Executive Officer of Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), failed to honour a fourth invitation to appear before the Public Accounts Committee over a ₦210 trillion audit query spanning 2017 to 2023.
Members of the committee, chaired by Senator Aliyu Wadada, expressed outrage at the persistent absence of the NNPCL chief, warning of possible sanctions if he fails to appear on Wednesday by 3.00pm.
The committee is probing findings from the Auditor-General for the Federation which flagged unaccounted expenditures by the company during the six-year period.
Ojulari, in a letter dated July 22 and read aloud by the committee clerk, Mohammed Abdullahi, attributed his absence to an urgent presidential summons by President Bola Tinubu at 1:00 p.m. the same day.
Despite the explanation, senators questioned the authenticity of the excuse, accusing the GCEO of undermining legislative oversight. Senator Victor Umeh acknowledged the weight of a presidential call but warned against using it as a recurring justification to avoid parliamentary accountability.
Senator Joel Thomas Onowakpo was more pointed, accusing the NNPCL boss of treating the committee with disregard.
“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,” he stated.
Senator Aminu Abbas echoed the sentiment, insisting that no chief executive of a public corporation was above legislative summons. He called for an immediate order compelling Ojulari’s appearance before the panel.
The committee had previously issued three invitations to Ojulari, all unanswered, sparking suspicion among lawmakers that the NNPCL is deliberately evading scrutiny over the massive audit discrepancies.
