The Group Managing Director of NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru should be made to answer certain questions on the issues surrounding contracts relating to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Minister of State for Petroleum Dr. Ibe Kachikwu’s allegations that presidential approval was sought and obtained in respect of these contracts sometimes in July, 2017. A logical inference that could be made from that line of response is that, President Buhari signed the Multibillion dollars contracts in question, when he was on his sick bed in London. This is because, we were all aware that President Buhari transmitted a letter to the National Assembly at that time for sick leave and making the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbjo the Acting President.

So one wonders the possibility of the President signing those contracts not the president at that material time? Isn’t that unconstitutional? Does it mean that President Buhari never did hand over power to the Vice President in actual sense?

According to the leaked memo, Dr Kachikwu said;

The following major contracts were never reviewed by or discussed with me Board of NNPC:

The Crude Term contracts- value at over $10bn
The DSDP contracts- value over $5bn
The AKK pipeline contract- value approximately $3bn
Various financing allocation funding contracts with the NOCs – value over $3bn
Various NPDC production service contracts – value at over $3bn–$4bn

After Dr Baru has said Presidential approval was sought and obtained, in response to Dr Ibe Kachukwu’s allegations, Prof. Osinbajo subsequently was reported to have said the contracts were approved by him. Isn’t that an afterthought? Assuming but not conceding Prof Osinbajo did approve the contracts, I also dare to ask whether such contracts can be approved unilaterally without the NNPC Tender Board’s input or consideration. Was it also tabled before the FEC before such approval or they can be approved without recourse any Board or FEC?  These are questions left unanswered.

Further to the above, it could be observed further that, if any government can contradict itself this much like the present administration, then it shows how incompetent that government is. Few days ago, Dr Baru claimed the contracts of about $26Billion dollars were approved by the *President* and just the following day, Prof Osinbajo admitted approving such contracts as the Acting President when the President Buhari was away.

The first question that came to my mind was why ADMITTING if nothing went wrong in the first place? My contextual understanding of admission is when something went wrong and you concede to a fault.. But later yesterday, the Vice President released a press statement to the effect that what he approved were loans and not contracts. What does this tend to achieve?

Assuming but not conceding that he indeed approved loans and not contracts, who then approved the $26Billion contracts in question? But what was the vice president thinking when he admitted approving some contract? Was he misquoted by the media? If not, who then approved the said contracts? What is the value of the loans approved by the V.P? I am also aware that NNPC in his defence to Kachukwu allegations said that certain contracts have no specified or fixed values/amount as opposed to the Minister’s claims and allegations. What about those contracts? Who approved them? The Board? The President or Vice President while Acting?

What is more surprising over this issue is that fact that the presidency has disowned the existence of any $26Billion contracts let alone the approval. The question now is, was Dr Kachikwu not aware of the activities of NNPC when he listed those contracts? Moreover, he is the Board Chairman of NNPC. Can the Presidency know more about the affairs of NNPC than the Board Chairman and State Minister of Petroleum? Why hasn’t the GMD of NNPC responded on the non-existence of these contracts? At least the allegations were made against the GMD of NNPC not the presidency.  Why is it the defence coming from the Presidency? Are there certain things happening within NNPC and the Presidency over this matter that we do not need to know as citizen? As a matter of fact, there can be no smoke without fire.

There are still so many questions hovering around the integrity of Prof Osinbajo, President Buhari, and Dr Maikanti Baru on this matter. It is only these personalities that can exculpate themselves with logical and clear explanations. Then this government should do well in putting their thoughts together and ruminate over them before going to the press. The government must learn to clearly and unambiguously communicate their intention to Nigerians. More so, this administration is perceived a composition of technocrats.

I know our love for our President does not make us see anything wrong in his actions and that of his subordinates. But then, we shouldn’t allow the love to blur our sense of objectivity in addressing these issues that concern national integrity and treasury. You and I do have certain curiosities to be satisfied as tax payers.

Muhammed Ndakudu Adam

Lagos Based Human Rights and Constitutional Lawyer.