06 April 2014, Lagos – The All Progressives Congress, APC, has asked the National Assembly Committees probing alleged revenue losses and sleaze at the NNPC, especially the crude-oil-for-refined-product barter programme, to beam their searchlight on the activities of the two companies involved in the programme, in view of recent developments concerning the firms.
In a statement issued on Sunday by its Interim National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said that the two firms involved in the swap programme, Taleveras and Aiteo, recently submitted the highest and unmatched bid of $2.85 billion for the largest of Shell Nigeria’s four oil blocks slated for sale, the Oil Mining Lease (OML) 29, which Shell is selling with its 97-kilometre Nembe Creek oil pipeline.
It described as simply incredulous the fact that the two firms, with a track record as oil marketers (not explorers) of less than five years, could make such a huge bid, adding that this has put into a glaring context what may be the opacity of the barter programme under which the NNPC exchanges a huge chunk of the 445,000 barrels per day meant for domestic refining.
