Sanusi insisted that the President should not be the Minister of Petroleum.
Former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, has called for a proper audit of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), noting that this call was what cost him his job at the apex bank.
Sanusi made this known while delivering his remarks at The Bank Directors Summit holding at the Congress Hall of the Transcorp Hilton in Abuja.
Sanusi, who was CBN governor from June 2009 to February 2014, insisted that the President should not be the Minister of Petroleum.
For the ex-CBN chief, the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) must remain until banks get together and pay up what they owe the system.
He also maintained that the banking sector must shore up its trust deficit in the eyes of the public and that there is no need to amend the CBN Act to keep the apex bank free of political influences.
In August, about three months after his inauguration, President Bola Tinubu split the Ministry of Petroleum Resources with the appointment of Ekperipe Ekpo as Minister of State, Gas Resources; and Heineken Lokpobiri as Minister of State, Petroleum Resources.
However, Tinubu, in an apparent tradition of his predecessor, ex-President Muhammadu Buhari, kept the position of the substantive Minister of Petroleum Resources to himself.
President Does Not Have To Be Minister Of Petroleum, Falae Backs Sanusi
Falae also suggested that the Federal Government repair and sell Nigeria’s crude oil refineries to private individuals who can run them better.
An elder statesman and a former Minister of Finance, Chief Olu Falae, says Nigeria’s president does not have to be the minister of petroleum, adding that it is important to appoint a minister to oversee the ministry.
His position is in support of former central bank governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, who earlier said that the president should not be minister of petroleum, believing that appointing a minister of petroleum will make it possible to have someone to be held responsible when things don’t go right.
Ex-President Muhammadu Buhari held the position during his time with incumbent Bola Tinubu towing the same line. But the elder statesman argued that the petroleum ministry ought to have a minister in charge and not the president.
The president does not have to be the minister of petroleum – a former finance minister Olu Falae.
“I believe that there ought to be a minister for every important subject in government including petroleum. But I know that petroleum is so important to the finances of government that no president has been able to take his hands off petroleum completely,” he said on Thursday’s edition of Channels Television’s Politics Today.
“Not Babangida because we had Minister for Petroleum, not Obasanjo because we had Buhari as Petroleum Minister, no President has been able to take his hands off petroleum because it is so important.
“But conceptually, it is necessary and important to have a man of integrity called a minister to manage the petroleum industry in my view on behalf of the president and Nigeria so that he can be held accountable.
“I think it is good for us to have a petroleum minister. All ministers report to the president but the president does not have to be the petroleum minister,” Falae said.
‘Politics Will Intervene’
The former presidential candidate also suggested that the Federal Government repair and sell Nigeria’s crude oil refineries to private individuals who can run them better.
“My belief is that Nigeria’s problem with fuel and its price will be substantially resolved when we are able to repair and recommission our refineries and sell to companies that know how to run refineries,” he added.
“We should not try to run them ourselves because if we try to do so, politics will intervene and we will mismanage them. I am sorry to say this.”
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