Senate Committee on Gas Resources probing the N250 billion Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) intervention funds to some firms in the oil and gas sector has threatened to involve the anti-graft agencies to recover the money from defaulting beneficiaries.
The panel gave the threat when the affected companies, numbering 14, who had so far collected N135 billion out of the funds, appeared before it yesterday, to defend the utilisation of the loans they collected.
The members described as unacceptable, the fact that there was no synergy between the Ministry of Petroleum Resources and the CBN on the project.
They also queried the discriminatory disbursement of the funds to the beneficiaries and wondered why some firms collected more than the N10 billion credit limit.
The Chairman of the Committee, Senator Agom Jarigbe, collected the records of the beneficiaries and the locations of their project sites for immediate investigations.
Speaking at the investigative hearing, Jarigbe lamented that the funds released under the gas expansion and intervention fund were inappropriately accessed.
He said, “The task of the committee is to ensure that the companies actually expended the funds on what they collected it for.
“The observation of the committee is that there are inconsistencies in the process and the committee may not hesitate to involve the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to recover the funds.
