FORMER petroleum minister Diezani Alison-Madueke has been accused of unilaterally authorising trading companies to lift $24bn worth of crude oil from Nigeria between 2011 and 2014 without any formal contract.  

Highly controversial, Ms Alison-Madueke, who served as petroleum minister between 2010 and 2015 under former president Dr Goodluck Jonathan, has been the subject of anti-corruption investigations lately. Currently in London where she is facing corruption and money laundering charges, Ms Alison-Madueke was arrested on October 2 by the UK's National Crime Agency (NCA).  

She has been released on bail after an injunction was obtained to seize £27,000 from her and she was asked to deposit her passport with the court. Investigations into corrupt deals that took place under her watch have continued and yesterday a former group managing director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Austin Oniwon, confirmed that there was no formal contract between the corporation and trading companies for four years. 

Mr Oniwon told the House of Representatives Ad Hoc Committee on Crude Oil Swap that Ms Alison-Madueke, merely granted the extension of an earlier contract. He told the committee is chaired by an All Progressives Congress lawmaker from Kwara State, Hon Zakari Mohammed, that the extension was not a formal contract before he left office in 2012. 

“There was an approval for the extension by the minister. I believe the records are with the NNPC,” Mr Oniwon added. 

In 2010, the NNPC began taking 445,000 barrels of crude daily for refining in a bid to meet the country’s local demand of petroleum products. However, when the country’s refineries failed to run, the NNPC resorted to exchanging the crude as swaps for refined products through an arrangement with appointed crude trading firms. 

Apparently, the original contract was signed between the NNPC and two crude traders Duke Oil and Tranfigura in 2010 to last for one year and officially expired in 2011. However, Ms Alison-Madueke reportedly granted an extension of the contract without the NNPC formally signing another contract on the new second deal. 

Mr Oniwon also argued that as managing director of the NNPC, he did not require presidential or federal executive council approval to enter into the swap arrangements. According to Oniwon, the 445,000 barrels of crude were the property of the NNPC, which it bought from the federal government at the prevailing rate for refining, adding that swap crude was different from federation crude, which is entirely the property of the government