To allow the N9 trillion contracts to survive is to make illegality a shining light
As the week wound to an end, the tempest over the N9 trillion contracts awarded by the NNPC still shakes the polity. It is not enough that we are appalled by the staggering sum or the unfathomable silence of the country’s chief executive.
We must at this stage go to the point where we demand that since the contracts were awarded against the letter and spirit of the law, President Muhammadu Buhari should review the transactions with a view to terminating them. That is the only step that will resolve the issue.
It is clear no credible defence came from the office of Dr. Maikanti Baru, the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the NNPC. His points were sometimes evasive, at other times imperious but always without respect for either the grundnorm, the Nigerian constitution, or the immediate NNPC Act, or both. The argument that the contracts were not contracts but an offer for the other party to measure their value in crude oil actually is so puerile it seems the man takes Nigerians for fools. He fails to acknowledge the meaning of contract, which points to an agreement between two or more parties. Do the barrels of crude oil not have value?
Secondly, Baru said he did not need to consult the board or the Minister of State for Petroleum, Dr. Emmanuel Kachikwu. That claim flouts the law and gloats over its impunity. It spurns section 6 (c) of the NNPC Act that imbues the board with the approving authority to enter into agreements with external entities. That eliminates the claims by Dr. Baru that such powers rest with the tender’s board. By making the tender’s board the approving authority he makes himself the owner of the process rather than the law. The GMD approves the members of the tender’s board, so that makes it beholden to him. For him to see the tender’s board as the be-all and end-all of contracts is to make Dr. Baru the alpha and omega of contracts. It belittles the democratic nature of our system and throws open the door of manipulation and corrupt enrichment.
There have also been recriminations, one of which was the charge that Kachikwu is guilty of what he accused Baru’s NNPC of committing. As the cliché goes, two wrongs don’t make a right. By making that claim is Dr. Baru not admitting that he subverted the genuine process?
The president called for an audience with the Minister of State, and we are not privy to their conversation. Neither has any statement been made public about it. But he must have value as the Minister of State, hence he appointed him to that position and made him the chairman of the NNPC board.
If he – the president – sides with Baru, it means he undermined his own appointee and passed over his head. When such things happen, it does not only signal a disdain for order but it spews out favouritism, a charge now familiar in this presidential terrain.
Again, the constitution says that he delegates his position to ministers and not to any other office. Hence section 148 (1) says “the president may, in his description, assign to the vice president or any minister of the Government of the Federation responsibility for any business of Government of the Federation, including the administration of any office of government.” This impels the president not to work with Dr. Baru but with Dr. Kachikwu. If he operates as Minister of Petroleum, then he could not have been on duty when the contracts were allegedly awarded. So, in his absence as Petroleum Minister, the Acting Petroleum Minister was Dr. Kachikwu and not the NNPC GMD.
If the contract was awarded with his approval when he was on medical leave, it was illegal and even impeachable. It would have shown disdain for the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, who was Acting President.
Again, Dr. Baru showed no evidence of complying with the constitutional provision that forbids any deal without compliance with the Public Procurement Act, and that implies the process must go through the corridors of the Bureau of Public Procurement and the National Council of Public Procurement.
Some confusion rent the issue until Prof. Osinbajo’s clarification that it was loans, not contracts, he approved. So, the matter still goes straight back to the president. It is dangerous that Dr. Baru claims he does not need the board. For what purpose was the board set up? It is no sinecure entity. If its role is to supervise the workings of the corporation, it means contracts above $20 million dollars ought to have its attention. Apparently, it has not. He says the board is to “review” and “advise.” Those are heavy words in officialdom. When a superior reviews, it means it has the power to accept and reject. To advise also means to order or instruct.
It is also shocking that while Dr. Baru’s position denies the sum total of the contracts is N9 trillion or $25 billion, it merely described Kachikwu’s alleged figures as “humongous.” He has not told us the actual sum, according to him.
This goes into the fundamental problem of the Dr. Baru defence: its lack of transparency. It baffles us that in spite of the inconsistencies of the report, the president has not yet addressed the issue. It is obvious either Kachikwu or Baru has flouted the law. Kachikwu if he lied, Baru if he lied. Calls for reconciliation are not even patriotic. What we want is to reconcile the claims with the truth. That means all the documents in the matter should be brought to the public space. We hope the Senate, not an exemplar in such matters, will do a good job investigating the matter. We should not forget that the money is outside the nation’s budget.
Dr. Baru was silent on the appointments. It was bad enough that Buhari gave us an ethnically contemptuous board. Baru’s lack of board consultation before making his appointments only shows that he finds the president’s example of lofty disdain worth aping.
President Buhari may claim he respects probity, but with his acceptance of Baru’s conduct, his war of corruption has lost traction and moral authority. He can only redeem his name by cancelling the deals and allowing the process to start over according to the laws of the land.
