11 July 2012, Sweetcrude, ABUJA – IF all goes well, the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, NEITI, would, before the end of this year, issue the oil and gas audit for the period 2009 to 2011 and the solid minerals audit for 2007 to 2010.
Specifically, Orji Ogbonnaya Orji, NEITI’s Director, Communication of NEITI, who disclosed this in a statement in Abuja, said the exercise, being handled for the first time by two indigenous firms, has reached advanced stage.
The statement read: “By the 2012 audit about to be commissioned in addition to the ones on-going audits, NEITI is set to meet this important national expectation.
“This step by NEITI is fundamental especially at this time when issues of transparency, accountability and corporate governance of revenues from Nigerian’s abundant natural resources especially oil and gas have become a matter of national concern to both Nigerians at home and around the world,”
Orji maintained that the action to embark on the procurement process for the next cycle of industry audit was necessitated by the need to bridge gaps and publish current vital information and data that would be of public interest on payments made by oil and gas by companies to the Federation account in 2012, establish the actual amount that the Federal Government received through its relevant agencies.
He noted that the NEITI Audit would also find out if the companies paid what they were expected to pay and if government received what it was expected to receive as at and when due. The payments and receipts are with respect to taxes, royalties, levies, signature, bonuses among others.
