Business

PENGASSAN Fingers Military In 600,000-barrel Daily Stolen

Published

2 years ago

September 22, 2022

Editor

The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria has said that the military should be held responsible for the high rate of crude oil theft in the country.

This was made known at the Senate’s investigation into oil lifting and theft on Wednesday, which was chaired by Senator Akpan Bassey.

The National President of PENGASSAN, Festus Osifo, said oil theft was a collaborative crime between military personnel assigned to protect oil installations and the locals running illegal refineries.

He alleged that the military and other security agencies were aiding and abetting criminals to steal the crude with the active connivance of the regulatory agencies in charge of the nation’s petroleum industry.

Osifo, therefore, challenged the regulatory agencies and various security outfits to be alive to their responsibilities in order to solve the problems.

He specifically alleged that men of the Amphibious Brigade in Port Harcourt and their counterparts in the Navy, in connivance with superior officers at different times, joined the locals in the theft.

Osifo alleged, “One of the greatest problems we have, which nobody has highlighted, is that there is strong connivance of our security forces in the crime. There is no doubt about this. From our Army to our Navy officers, we have information that they pay their superiors to post them to some areas in the Niger Delta.

“I can authoritatively inform this committee that men of the Nigerian Army and the Navy pay their superiors to be posted to Niger Delta. Even when the former Commander of the Amphibious Brigade in Port Harcourt was removed, many of the men in the command resisted being posted out due to the ‘lucrativeness’ of their operational areas.

“I think the people who have a solution to this problem are not even the ones sitting here. They are the ones you will invite behind the camera”.

Also, the Executive Commissioner, Corporate Services and Administration in Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Mr Jide Adeola, said about 600,000 barrels of crude oil were stolen per day.

He said, “As of today, Nigeria produces 1.23million barrels of crude oil per day as against 1.8million barrels targeted, leading to total revenue loss, as of today, of $2.1billion or N877billion.”

Worried by the submissions, the Chairman of the Committee, Akpan Bassey, said he had never seen “economic sabotage of this magnitude and it must be stopped.”

“The required political will through the instrumentality of legislative intervention shall surely be done after meeting other critical stakeholders like the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation Limited, the Military, etc,” he noted.

The Senate also lamented that the country was losing over 900,000 barrels per day to oil thieves, stressing that the massive oil theft would crumble the economy.

Bassey said if the ongoing theft was not immediately stopped, it would also frustrate the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act passed into law last year by the National Assembly.

Speaking at the investigative hearing on the experience of the committee during its oversight visit to major platforms in the Niger Delta, the senator expressed shock over the humongous loss of national oil revenues due to oil theft and sabotage.

Bassey stated that the committee discovered that pipelines carrying crude oil could not be identified because they were covered with no right of way, making it difficult to monitor these pipelines.

He told the stakeholders that the shortfall in the country’s oil revenues was not caused by oil theft alone but also by the inability to have evacuation access, effective metering and monitoring by operators as well as the unwillingness of security agencies to checkmate the incidents.

He lamented that the Bonny Terminal, which hitherto produces 60,000 barrels per day, had not produced a single barrel for the past seven months.

Also speaking at the occasion, the Senate President, Senator Ahmad Lawan, who had declared the investigative hearing open, said it was the view of the Senate that oil theft impacted negatively on the country’s oil production and revenues, hence its decision to set up the committee to come up with a workable template to arrest the situation.

Lawan, who was represented at the occasion, also charged stakeholders to come up with a plan to end this national challenge.

He said, “It is regrettable that the criminals are perpetrating the unfortunate crime with the active connivance of stakeholders, including security personnel.

“The Senate will stop at nothing to unveil the criminals behind the crime and that is why we set an ad hoc committee to unravel the thieves and come up with workable solutions to end the menace, before December this year.”

A member of the committee, the senator representing Kano South senatorial district, Senator Kabir Kaya, noted that while Nigeria’s OPEC quota was 1.8 million BPD, the country currently produces 1,2 million BPD, showing a shortfall of 600,000 BPD. He challenged the stakeholders and the operators to find a solution to this problem.

PUNCH

Business

FULL LIST: CBN Publishes List Of Licensed Deposit Money Banks

Published

20 mins ago

May 8, 2024

Editor

The Central Bank of Nigeria has released a comprehensive list of licensed Deposit Money Banks operating within the country.

The list, which was made public on the CBN’s official website on Tuesday, provides insights into the banking landscape in Nigeria.

Banks with international authorisation include Access Bank Limited, Fidelity Bank Plc, First City Monument Bank Limited, First Bank Nigeria Limited, Guaranty Trust Bank Limited, United Bank of Africa Plc, and Zenith Bank Plc.

Commercial banks with national authorisation include Citibank Nigeria Limited, Ecobank Nigeria Limited, Heritage Bank Plc, Globus Bank Limited, Keystone Bank Limited, Polaris Bank Limited, Stanbic IBTC Bank Limited, Standard Chartered Bank Limited, Sterling Bank Limited, Titan Trust Bank Limited, Union Bank of Nigeria Plc, Unity Bank Plc, Wema Bank Plc, Premium Trust Bank Limited and Optimus Bank Limited.

Commercial banks with regional licenses are Providus Bank Limited, Parallex Bank Limited, Suntrust Bank Nigeria Limited, and Signature Bank Limited.

Players in the non-interest banking sector with national authorisation include Jaiz Bank Plc, Taj Bank Limited, Lotus Bank Limited, and Alternative Bank Limited.

In the merchant banking category, the apex banks listed, are Coronation Merchant Bank Limited, FBN Merchant Bank Limited, FSDH Merchant Bank Limited, Greenwich Merchant Bank Limited, Nova Merchant Bank Limited, and Rand Merchant Bank Limited.

The financial holding companies listed were Access Holdings Plc, FBN Holdings Plc, FCMB Group Plc, FSDH Holding Company Limited, Guaranty Trust Holding Company Plc, Stanbic IBTC Holdings Plc, and Sterling Financial Holdings Limited.

The Mauritius Commercial Bank Representative Office (Nigeria) Limited was listed as the sole representative office.

Business

[ICYMI]FULL LIST: 16 Banking Transactions Exempted From CBN’s New

Published

1 day ago

May 7, 2024

Editor

The Central Bank of Nigeria on Monday directed all banks to commence charging a 0.5 per cent cybersecurity levy on all electronic transactions within the country.

The apex bank stated this in a circular signed by the Director, Payments System Management Department, Chibuzo Efobi; and the Director, Financial Policy and Regulation Department, Haruna Mustafa; a copy of which was obtained by The PUNCH.

The circular, which was directed to all commercial, merchant, non-interest, and payment service banks, among others; noted that the implementation of the levy would start two weeks from Monday, May 6, 2024.

“The levy shall be applied at the point of electronic transfer origination, then deducted and remitted by the financial institution. The deducted amount shall be reflected in the customer’s account with the narration, ‘Cybersecurity Levy,’” the circular partly read.

In this piece, The PUNCH highlights all the 16 banking transactions that are exempted from the CBN’s new cybersecurity levy:

Loan disbursements and repayments
Salary payments
Intra-account transfers within the same bank or between different banks for the same customer
Intra-bank transfers between customers of the same bank
Other Financial Institutions instructions to their correspondent banks
Interbank placements,
Banks’ transfers to CBN and vice-versa
Inter-branch transfers within a bank
Cheque clearing and settlements
Letters of Credits

Banks’ recapitalisation-related funding – only bulk funds movement from collection accounts
Savings and deposits, including transactions involving long-term investments such as Treasury Bills, Bonds, and Commercial Papers.
Government Social Welfare Programmes transactions e.g. Pension payments
Non-profit and charitable transactions, including donations to registered non-profit organisations or charities
Educational institutions’ transactions, including tuition payments and other transactions involving schools, universities, or other educational institutions
Transactions involving bank’s internal accounts such as suspense accounts, clearing accounts, profit and loss accounts, inter-branch accounts, reserve accounts, nostro and vostro accounts, and escrow accounts.

Business

ICYMI: Five Things To Know About The New Cybersecurity Levy To Be Paid By Nigerians

Published

1 day ago

May 7, 2024

Editor

The Central Bank of Nigeria, on Monday, directed banks and other financial institutions to start charging a cybersecurity levy on all banking transactions.

According to the circular sighted by The PUNCH, the implementation of the levy would start in two weeks.

The circular read in part, “Following the enactment of the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc) (amendment) Act 2024 and pursuant to the provision of Section 44 (2)(a) of the Act, ‘a levy of 0.5% (0.005) equivalent to a half percent of all electronic transactions value by the business specified in the Second Schedule of the Act,’ is to be remitted to the National Cybersecurity Fund, which shall be administered by the Office of the National Security Adviser.”

Here are some things to know about the cybersecurity levy to be paid by Nigerians, according to the CBN circular:

1. A new levy of 0.5%, equivalent to half per cent, is applied to electronic transactions as mandated by the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention, etc) (amendment) Act 2024.

2. The levy is paid by the originator of the electronic transaction and deducted by the financial institution. The deducted amount shall be reflected in the customer’s account with the narration: “Cybersecurity Levy.”

3. Financial institutions will deduct the levy and remit it to the National Cybersecurity Fund administered by the Office of the National Security Adviser.

4. Deductions shall commence within two weeks from the date of the circular, May 6, and financial institutions must remit collected levies in bulk to the NCF account domiciled at the CBN monthly by the fifth business day of the following month.

5. Financial institutions have deadlines to update their systems to handle levy deduction and remittance. Failure to remit the levy can result in penalties, including a fine of up to 2% of a financial institution’s annual turnover.