By Haruna Salami
The Ministry of Petroleum Resources has defended its 2025 budget before the National Assembly Joint Committee on Petroleum Upstream, NMDPRA and Gas amidst chaos.
The Joint Committee meeting which held at Senate wing of the National Assembly was first faced with inadequate seats for Distinguished senators and Honourable members.
It got so bad that ‘Honourable Members’ were asked to stand up for senators who were standing, but this was vehemently opposed by the members.
The chaotic situation forced the Joint Chairman, Senator Agom Jarigbe make the committee go into a closed session for about 30 minutes.
When the committee resumed, again it was faced with the problem of none availability of the budget document, which the Minister of State Gas, Ekperikpe Ekpo prepared for the members to follow him.
Minister of State (Petroleum) Heineken Lokpobiri apologized profusely:
“Distinguished Senators and all of our members of the House of Representatives, sorry for the mix-up. It is not intended at all. It is not deliberate. What is happening is not deliberate at all. And I’ve been told by the directors in charge of budget that the documents are right in the National Assembly, and that they are bringing them.
“So please, first of all, let me apologize that we will never do anything deliberately. We’re human beings. I mean, we could, by either commission or mission do certain things that may not be in the best interest of everybody, but it can never be deliberate. We will never.
There’s only one institution that we belong to. Throughout my life, I’ve been a parliamentarian from 1999 until today, save for 2015 to 2019 when I was Minister of State Agriculture. This is where I belong to and I will never do anything, to deliberately disrespect this institution.
“So, I want to specifically apologize to all of you, and in particular to my chairman, Upstream House of Reps, who is my friend, that I’m very sorry for whatever mix-up that’s going on.
But having said that, if you could allow us a few minutes, I believe that we’ll be able to bring the Ghana must go here. There is no money oo, but at least, the documents are here so that the press will not say that we are bringing money to you. These are the documents that, you know. The documents are just coming. So, I sincerely apologize.
However, Hon. Ado Doguwa, Chairman, Upstream responded thus:
“Honourable Minister, I thank you for presenting that apology, but I would like to, on behalf of the leadership of this joint session, further state that while it is human to commit an error, it is also human to present an apology like you did.
“On our own part, we have no problem accepting your apologies, but the fact is that we cannot be apologetic in the discharge of our constitutional duties as lawmakers of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, especially on a matter like this one, which is to do with appropriation of public funds. We can’t be apologetic, and I appreciate the fact that both of you are members of this institution for life.
“The Honourable Minister Gas was in the House of Representatives. You have been in the Senate for quite a long time, and we feel you should not only be our ambassadors by word of mouth. You must have to be our ambassadors out there and in here by word of mouth and by action.
I want to ask very respectfully, Mr. Minister, is it in accordance with our procedure to receive documents on budget presentation on the very minute that we are considering the budget and you are defending it? No. In the letters? In the letters we have written to all the ministries, we have specified through our class that these documents are supposed to be submitted to us at least 48 hours before now, and they are being presented just now. So that’s our concern.
“We can understand ourselves as human beings, but when it comes to the issue of discharging our duties where people lay their expectations and hopes on us, we have to do it discreetly.
“Honourable Minister, please, I am putting this on record for the future. Because you still have two more budgets to present here. If we should continue in the manner we are doing, then definitely we cannot be on the same page”.
Senator Jarigbe tried frantically and succeeded in calming frayed nerves for the meeting to continue.
The Minister of State (Gas), Ekperikpe Ekpo said the total appropriation of the ministry for 2024 covering personnel, overhead and capital was N9.9 billion.
The total release was N5.8 billion with a balance of N4.053 billion.
On 2025 he said N4.251 billion according to the envelope budget given to the ministry l, which is a reduction from the 2024 budget.
Sectorial allocation is as follows: personnel -N1.656 billion, overhead -N1.692 billion and capital – N903 million totalingN4.251 billion.
