Nigeria’s Oil Assets: Oye demands probe into NNPC’s ₦11.2trn receivables

The Chairman of the Alliance for Economic Research and Ethics, AERE, Dele Oye, has called for an independent probe into the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited’s ₦11.201 trillion receivables from the federation, demanding a transparent breakdown of the claims and the actual cost of securing the nation’s oil and gas assets.

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Oye, who made the call in a policy analysis titled, “The ₦11.2 Trillion Bodyguard: A Receivable in a Security Uniform,” said the figures disclosed in NNPC’s 2025 annual report raised critical questions about the composition of the outstanding balance, the documentation of the underlying transactions and the reconciliation of obligations between the national oil company and the Federation.

He, however, cautioned against interpreting the ₦11.2 trillion balance as money spent on security in 2025, stressing that the figure represents year-end receivables rather than expenditure incurred during the financial year.

According to the report, NNPC’s other receivables from the Federation stood at ₦11.201 trillion at the end of December 2025, up from ₦8.840 trillion in 2024. The company broadly attributed the balance to advances to the Federation and costs incurred in protecting oil and gas assets under a government-approved framework.

But Oye said the published accounts did not provide sufficient details to establish how much of the balance related to physical security, advances to government or other financial obligations.

He said the government and NNPC must open the books to public scrutiny, insisting that the management of petroleum revenues and obligations should not be obscured by broad accounting descriptions.

“The ₦11.2 trillion bodyguard is not a 2025 security bill,” Oye declared.

₦8.67trn energy-security balance reconciliation

Explaining the accounting treatment, Oye said NNPC’s Note 24.2 recorded no energy-security expense for 2025, while an opening energy-security receivable of ₦8.672 trillion, carried forward from 2024, was reconciled in September 2025.

The amount was offset against royalties, taxes and dividends due to the Federation as of December 2024, contributing to a reduction in total Federation receivables from ₦17.512 trillion to ₦11.201 trillion.

He said the reconciliation did not remove the need for greater transparency, arguing that a receivable involving public funds, petroleum operations and government obligations required more detailed disclosure.

“That does not end the transparency question; it finally starts it properly. A receivable from the Federation is not an invoice from a private customer. It sits at the intersection of public finance, petroleum operations and sovereign authority. When the label is broad, scrutiny must become narrow,” he said.

Oye also explained that the energy-security framework was not limited to the protection of pipelines and other petroleum infrastructure. Under the Petroleum Industry Act framework cited by NNPC, the label also covered its supplier-of-last-resort role and, during the regulated petrol period, price-under-recovery obligations.

He described under-recovery as the difference between the actual landing cost of imported petrol and the regulated selling price, noting that exchange-rate movements could widen the gap. However, he said NNPC’s 2025 report did not separately quantify the foreign-exchange component.

In his view, the broad classification combined physical asset protection with oil-market and public-finance arrangements that should be accounted for separately.

Demands public register of costs

To address the disclosure gaps, Oye called for a publicly accessible register separating physical oil and gas asset security costs, supplier-of-last-resort and price-under-recovery obligations, and advances to the Federation.

He proposed a three-column reconciliation showing, for each category, the legal authority, beneficiaries, supporting invoices, cash status, amounts offset against government obligations and measurable outcomes.

“Nigeria should therefore insist on a three-column public reconciliation: physical asset security; supplier-of-last-resort/price-under-recovery support; and advances to the Federation. Each column should show the legal authority, beneficiary, invoice, cash status, offset status and measurable result,” he said.

The AERE chairman said the disclosures should be supported by verifiable evidence of the protection and maintenance of the infrastructure concerned, enabling Nigerians to distinguish actual security expenditure from other financial arrangements recorded in the company’s books.

He argued that a credible accountability framework must document the costs incurred, transactions completed, obligations settled and results achieved.

Questions over NNPC’s profit growth

Beyond the receivables, Oye raised questions about the composition of NNPC’s reported profit after tax of ₦7.183 trillion in 2025, compared with ₦5.414 trillion in 2024.

He acknowledged the company’s reported achievements, including peak crude and condensate production of 1.77 million barrels per day, its highest level in five years, and a declared dividend of ₦5.8 trillion.

However, he noted that revenue fell 24 per cent to ₦34.517 trillion, while gross profit declined by about 20 per cent to ₦9.374 trillion, even as profit after tax increased.

According to him, the accounts showed that other income rose from ₦3.392 trillion in 2024 to ₦8.416 trillion in 2025, while an impairment charge of ₦753.557 billion in 2024 became a reversal of ₦325.432 billion in 2025.

Oye said NNPC attributed its largest other-income category, described as “sundry income”, to items including Trans-Forcados pipeline income, crude-processing fees, miscellaneous income from joint-venture operators and a write-back connected to an Amenam-Kpono stock-overlift claim.

He stressed that the figures did not invalidate the reported profit but warranted further explanation of the factors driving the increase.

“None of that makes the profit unreal. But it does make the simple victory dance incomplete. When a company’s profit grows while core revenue and gross profit retreat, citizens deserve to know which cash-generating operations did the lifting, which accounting estimates moved, and which one-off items may not return for an encore,” he said.

Oye added: “The numbers deserve applause before they receive interrogation.”

He said Nigerians should be able to see, line by line, how value was generated, what was owed, how obligations were settled and what benefits were delivered.

Pipeline maintenance disclosure

The AERE chairman also questioned the presentation of pipeline maintenance costs in NNPC’s accounts, warning against drawing conclusions from a single expense category without examining the broader cost structure.

He noted that the line item for pipeline maintenance costs fell from ₦149.478 billion in 2024 to ₦13.813 billion in 2025, a decline of 90.76 per cent.

However, he said “other direct costs” rose from ₦566.540 billion to ₦1.277 trillion over the same period. According to NNPC’s disclosures cited in the analysis, the broader category includes the maintenance and operation of wells, production facilities, pipelines and processing infrastructure, as well as integrity management, repairs and field support.

Oye said the figures did not establish that physical pipeline maintenance had fallen by 90 per cent, but exposed a reporting gap that made it difficult for the public to determine whether work had been postponed, reclassified, captured under another cost centre or performed more efficiently.

“So the accounts do not prove that physical maintenance collapsed by 90%.

They prove that the public cannot tell, from the published categories, whether work was postponed, reclassified, embedded in another cost centre or carried out more efficiently. That distinction is not a footnote; it is the governance issue,” he said.

He called on NNPC to publish an asset-integrity scorecard for each major trunk line, detailing planned and actual maintenance, incidents, downtime, integrity spending and independent inspection results.

“A pipeline is not a metaphor. It either holds pressure or it holds a press conference,” he added.

Calls for accountability, not publicity

Oye said NNPC’s reported financial and production achievements should be acknowledged but accompanied by stronger disclosure of the financial arrangements, future obligations and operational results behind the figures.

He also called for greater transparency over forward-sale commitments, arguing that a public commitments calendar was necessary to clarify obligations associated with future deliveries and their implications for domestic supply.

He cautioned that memoranda of understanding and public announcements could not substitute for verifiable operational performance, particularly where refinery operations were concerned.

“NNPC’s 2025 accounts contain real achievements: stronger reported profit, improved production and a notable dividend declaration. They also show a financial architecture in which major public questions can still hide inside broad labels, offsets and future-delivery obligations,” he said.

“The ₦11.2 trillion figure is not proof that ₦11.2 trillion was spent on security in 2025. It is a very large Federation receivable whose composition deserves a public ledger.”

He added that the maintenance figures did not prove that pipeline upkeep had disappeared, but highlighted a disclosure structure inadequate for a strategic national asset.

Oye urged the government and NNPC to strengthen the documentation and reconciliation of petroleum revenues, expenditure and obligations, insisting that public accountability must extend beyond headline profits and production figures.

“Nigeria does not need another acronym, another relaunch or another headline with a ribbon around it. It needs a receipt: names, dates, invoices, barrels, offsets, performance and cash,” he said.

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