How 1,733 NDDC contractors disappeared with N70.5bn

AUDITOR-General of the Federation, Samuel Ukura, yesterday, made a startling revelation on how contractors, who handled projects for Niger Delta Development Commission, NDDC, between 2008 and 2012, disappeared with N70.5 billion mobilisation fees without going to site, let alone executing the projects.
Ukura, who spoke through Mr. Emmanuel Akpan, an Assistant Director, Public Accounts Committee Division, in his office at a public hearing organised by the Senate Public Accounts Committee, insisted that the commission’s projects were abandoned.
He added that the Auditor-General’s office, based on findings made so far, strongly believed that the total sum of the scam stood at N70,495, 993,761.
He said: “The real value of contracts on which monies have been collected by NDDC contractors during the period under review, as at the time of auditing, was N70.4 billion and not N11 billion the NDDC office is claiming.
“There is need for NDDC officials to prove that contractors involved in the close to N60 billion gap they are trying to create have actually gone to site and executed their projects.”
Ukura further disclosed that no fewer than 1,733 contractors were involved in the scam.

NDDC officials disagree
However, while officials from the office of the Accountant-General of the Federation agreed with the submission made by the Auditor-General, NDDC officials led by their acting Managing Director, Ibim Semenitari, disagreed, saying latest records available to them indicated that N11 billion projects and not N70 billion were affected by the contract scam.
NDDC’s Director of Finance, Jimoh Egbejule, said the commission had audited the projects awarded during the period under review and discovered that the said scam affected N11 billion projects and not N70.5 billion.
The contradictory submissions forced the committee, through its Chairman, Senator Andy Uba, PDP, Anambra South, to adjourn the sitting for a month.
Fuming over the development, Uba said: “There is need to stop this public hearing to allow the three parties time to sit down and harmonise their findings and reports.
“Definitely, this committee is not satisfied with what has happened, but we have to give them time to meet and harmonise whatever they can before coming back to us to present their updated reports, upon which we can now do the proper probing without one agency saying it does not have the reports the other is presenting.
“The new MD did not know anything. She did not understand what was going on. They did not carry her along.
“I am glad that she is willing to work; she is ready to go through it with a fine tooth-comb, line by line, with the auditor-general and accountant-general’s queries to make sure that there is prompt response to the queries. In one month’s time, I am sure we would know the truth.”

Semenitari
The new NDDC boss, Semenitari, promised to go over the records properly within the one month duration given, with a view to later presenting before the committee the truth.
She said: “We would respond in all honesty with all of the documentations before us. But like I said, there might have been some errors here and there because they did not see all the documentation.
“It is too early to decide what it might be. I am sure by the time they respond fully, we would be able to show Nigerians facts as they are.
“Again, we would not shield any contractor who has not done his job. We would not shield anyone who is indicted. This is a new administration and we are committed to transparency.”