APC Seeks Probe Of Past NLNG Payment To FG

Rivers State Deputy Governor, Dr Ipalibo Banigo (right), receiving a souvenir from the wife of the Bishop of the Niger Delta Diocese, Mrs Victoria R. Ebirien, during a lecture to mark the 5th anniversary Enthronement service of the latter’s husband at St Peters’s Anglican Church, Port Harcourt

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has urged the Federal Government to investigate what happened to the past Company Income Tax/education tax as well as dividends paid to the Federal Government by the Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG), against the background of reports that the funds were never paid into the Federation Account as they should have been.
The party, which deplored efforts by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to discredit President Muhammadu Buhari for granting states a bailout, said the opposition party must be asked where it kept the $5.5 billion which it said was the dividend paid to the Federal Government by the NLNG before the 29 May handover.
In a statement issued yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party also described as a glaring example of grandstanding opposition the attempt by the PDP to distort the facts about the source of the $2.1billion that was approved for sharing by the three tiers of government by President Muhammadu Buhari.
“Whereas the Presidency corrected the initial erroneous report that the shared money was sourced from the Excess Crude Account (ECA), the skittish opposition continued to insist it was from the ECA and that it was part of the ‘savings’ by the Jonathan Administration.
While explaining the source of the bailout fund, APC said, “We can tell Nigerians that the $2.1 billion was sourced from the $1.6 billion Company Income Tax/Education Tax paid to the Federal Government on June 17th 2015, over two weeks after the Jonathan Administration left office, as well as the $500 million tax paid by Shell.