The House of Representatives yesterday Feb. 24th directed its Committees on Petroleum Upstream and Public Procurement to investigate an alleged $260 million dollars oil contract awarded by the National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS), a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC.
This directive followed a debate on a motion raised by Rep. Gabriel Kolawole (Akoko South East/South West Federal Constituency, Ondo State – APC). Hon Kolawole said that NAPIMS, granted approval for Esso Explora­tion, a subsidiary of Exxon Mobile to award four single source contracts for projects in Exxon Mobil’s Usan Deep water project at the total sum of $260 mil­lion without a tendering process.
Thye further ex­plained that NAPIMS had, through three mem­oranda dated October 13, 2014, February 10, 2015 and April 16, 2015, single handedly nomi­nated four companies to execute the contracts without approval from both the Board of the NNPC and its Group Executive Committee (GEC).
The joint committees have been given a period of 4 weeks to investigate the matter and report back to the House.