Uche Amunike
The House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts has charged the Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi and the Management of the Nigerian Ports Authority to explain the revenues accrued to the agency totalling N166.69bn which were not properly captured in his statement of account as of December 31 2016
The Committee has asked the Minister and the NPA to explain the the cost of services rendered to the authority to the tune of N103.99bn which their report said was made up of Channels and Waterways maintenance at N65.130bn as well as Ports and Quays expenses amounting to N38.41bn.
The officials have been invited to especially respond to queries issued by the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation on the financial statements of the NPA in 2016, 2017 and 2018.
According to an audit report from the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation, Adolphus Aghughu, the respective income from each of the services, scheduled oil terminal dues, details of pilotage and service boats and the nature of rental services offered and rates applied.
The report stated that on examination, the accounts revealed that the channels and waterways maintenance rose from N44.43bn in 2015 to N64.13bn in 2016, bringing it to an increase of over N20bn.
The NPA incurred about N38.41bn as service charge and the Ports and Quays alone.
The NPA management has therefore been asked to provide details of how these charges were incurred and what it meant by the term ‘others’, on which about N4.7 billion was spent.
The Auditor-General further stated that accounts of the NPA showed that Intel’s Integrated Services Limited was also overpaid commission to the tune of N2.1bn.
Amaechi and the NPA are to also explain what happened to the dividend income of N643.01m received from the Joint Venture partners and also, interest income of about N97.8 and 28.7m which were interest from bank deposits and interest of loans and receivables.
There were other queries against the NPA which included administrative expenses of N61bn, which included professional charges of N638 million; donation and subscription of N1.88bn; exchange loss of N7.3bn; defined benefit expenses of N11.4bn and Director’s remuneration of N4.2m.
Also identified by the office of the Accountant-General is what is called understatement of depreciation charges to the tune of N6.4bn stating that the provision made against 8 classes of property amounted to N4.47bn as against N10.89million arrived at during vetting.
Recall that Amaechi inaugurated a panel to investigate the policies, strategies and other management activities undertaken by the suspended NPA boss, Hadiza Bala-Usman during her time at the authority, charging them to examine and investigate the administrative policies and strategies adopted by her, while querying her for being unable to remit operating supplies to the consolidated revenue account.
He is to appear before the committee on July 8 where he and the Nigerian Ports Authority management team will give answers to the anomalies found in the reports by the office of the Accountant General of the federation.
