President Goodluck Jonathan has queried
the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mallam Lamido Sanusi, over
some items in the apex’s bank’s 2012 audit report.
A confirmation of the query was made by
the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben
Abati, when he was contacted by newsmen for a
reaction to a newspaper publication on Tuesday.
Although Abati was not specific in his
response, he said he was aware that “some issues” came up and the CBN
governor was asked to offer further explanations on them.
Abati, who added that the CBN governor
had since made clarifications, did not say whether the President was
satisfied with them or not.
“What I know is that some issues came up
and he (the CBN governor) was asked to explain and he has since done
so,” he said on the telephone.
An online news medium, PointblankNews.com,
had in the said publication claimed that Sanusi was queried by
Jonathan over some alleged infractions discovered in the bank’s 2012
audited account.
According to the publication, the query covered 22 issues bordering on infractions in the bank.
It also alleged that the CBN governor made some financial donations under the special access item in the CBN account.
The report by the news portal said that
the query was sent to the CBN governor on May 6, while a response was
expected back on May 8.
The CBN governor was, however, reported by the portal to have submitted his reply to the President on May 21.
Other issues raised in the query,
according to the online publication, include the write-off of about
N3.5bn CBN staff housing loan.
It also touched other issues such as
refusal of the apex bank to consolidate its accounts, the trillion naira
debt owed by the Asset Management Company, and the non-disclosure of
the total liabilities through the bond floated by the company.
Sanusi was also asked to explain the
discrepancies noted in the 2012 account regarding the Nigerian Security
Printing and Minting Company, a subsidiary of the CBN.
The CBN reacted swiftly, saying the
publication was the handiwork of mischief makers as it did not reflect
the reality on the ground.
In a telephone interview with one of our
correspondents in Abuja, the Director, Corporate Communications
Department of the CBN, Mr Ugochukwu Okoroafor, said that contrary to
the report, the bank’s account was not queried by the President.
He added that the CBN was the only
institution among the Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government
that was recently given an award by the National Assembly Committee on
Finance for presenting its account in a transparent manner.
For instance, he said the committee
specifically singled out the bank for contributing over 75 per cent of
MDA’s remittances to government coffers.
He said, “I have read that report and
those things written there are not true. I am not aware that the
President queried the CBN governor over that report. I am not aware of
that.
“The 2012 report has been out for some
time now and I can say that the CBN is the only institution that in
its accounts has always come out without any problem.
“In fact, even the finance committee
commended us. We are the only institution that has shown consistency in
terms of bringing out our reports on time and in terms of remittances.
“We have never failed in the history of the CBN. The finance committee gave us an award and this was celebrated.
“They gave us with the Nigerian Television Authority and they said we made over 75 per cent of the contributions by MDAs to their surplus and this happened just a few months ago.
“So the people are just being mischievious and we won’t succumb to any blackmail.”
Sanusi had last week while responding to
questions on the controversy surrounding the approval of the CBN’s
financial statement by the Financial Reporting Council, said the board
of the bank, and not the FRC, approved the report .
He had said, “On our accounts, the FRC does not approve our accounts. The board of the Central Bank had approved our accounts.
“The FRC is there to set accounting standards and to make sure they are improved on to meet international best practices.
“We published accounts and the FRC has
comments on those accounts; they will take those comments and we will
take on board whatever because they are the regulator as far as
preparing financial statements is concerned and just like banks respect
our own regulatory arena, we respect the FRC in its own regulatory
arena.
“So there is no question at all about
the non-approval, and I am not even aware of any issues that have been
raised and I will like to put an end to all of that speculation.
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