The Nigeria Navy says it had confiscated a total of 174 vessels in the nation’s territorial waters that were on involved in Oil related offences.
The director operations, Rear Admiral Olusola Oluwagbemi, disclosed this while testifying before the house of Representatives ad-hoc committee investigating the daily consumption of fuel in the country.
Rear Admiral Oluwagbemi who represented the Chief of Naval Staff said the vessels were confiscated in the nation’s territorial waters between January 2017 and July 2021.
He stated that the vessels were handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission EFCC and the Civil defense depending on the offense.
Oluwagbemi, revealed that from 2015 to date, over two hundred million metric tons of PMS was imported into Nigeria.
The Chairman of the committee, Mr Abdulkadir Abdullahi, stated that the committee was set up due to the inability of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company, NNPC Ltd to provide the accurate figure of daily consumption of Premium Motor Spirit PMS in the country.
Mr Abdullahi said this is to assist in solving the controversial fuel subsidy regime.
He added that the probe would no doubt help to strengthen fiscal federalism in the country as the figure is crucial to national planning.
The Chairman however expressed displeasure over the failure of the 43 oil companies invited to appear before the committee.
He explained that their actions could be interpreted to mean an attempt to sabotage efforts of the Committee , giving them a deadline of second August to honor the invitation.
Abdullahi stated that apart from bringing the companies to the parliament members of the Committee will also visit the distribution centers of the various companies.
Some of the invited oil companies include Petrocam Ltd, DP Oil Ltd, MRS Oil Ltd,,Sahara Energy Ltd, Oando Plc, AYM Shafa Ltd, Vitol Ltd, Transfigura Ltd, Prudent Energy Ltd, Brittania-U Ltd, Prudent Energy and Matrix Energy Ltd among others.