N10bn chartered jets: Diezani dares Reps

The Custodian April 20, 2014

A fresh face-off is imminent between Petroleum Resources Minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke and the National Assembly over an alleged N10billion expenditure on chartered jets between July 2012 and early 2014.

The minister, it was learnt, has no intention of honouring summons from the House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts on the alleged extra-budgetary expenditure. Smarting over how travel records of the minister got to the committee, Source gathered that two of her aides were reportedly fired last week. It was also learnt that the House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts, which is probing the N10 billion jet expenses is in possession of the manifest of the minister’s trips using the chartered jets. National Assembly sources confirmed yesterday that the commitee had secured information which showed that the owners of Challenger 850 jet were placed on retainership for exclusive use of the minister and that Vista Jet is being owed for 12 months.

The sources had put the basic cost per month at 500,000 Euros (about N130 million) totaling some N1.5 billion as outstanding debt for 12 months. It was confirmed that the owner of the hangar where the jet was usually parked, Evergreen, has already made submissions to the committee and had even supplied flight records. So far, the petroleum minister has refused to respond to inquiries from the Public Accounts Committee while some sources indicated that just like the House Committee, the  minister may also run into trouble with the Senate.

Just before going on the Easter recess, the Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream) had written the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to demand records of its expenses on jets hire and aircraft charters generally. Since October 2013, the Senator Magnus Abe-led committee had demanded for the records from the NNPC, asking the corporation to supply it with records of its existing aircraft and payments on chartered jets. Senator Abe told newsmen last week that the NNPC was yet to respond to its enquiries and that the committee might be left with no other option than to summon both the minister and the Group Managing Director(GMD), Mr. Andrew Yakubu. But investigations indicated that Yakubu may have washed his hands off the deal by not paying the outstanding debt owed the private airline.

“The NNPC has refused to pay the outstanding amount owed for chartering Challenger 850 jet because they were not involved in this particular jet hire…The only person who knows of the deal has been fired and when the GMD got to know of it, he balked and since then, the relationship between him and the minister has soured…”

The Committee has fixed a public hearing on the matter for April 28, while the Senator Abe committee has not said anything on what it intends to do should the NNPC continue to ignore the panel on the records.