The Group Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Bayo Ojulari, on Thursday failed to appear before the Senate Committee on Public Accounts for hearing on a missing N210 trillion due for remittance to the Federation Account.

This is the second time in about two weeks that the NNPCL chief will fail to appear before the Senate committee.

Ojulari was conspicuously absent when the committee invited the company management over the missing funds last month.

Rather than appearing in person on Thursday, the NNPCL boss sent representatives to the hearing held at the Assembly Complex in Abuja.

However, the committee declined to engage with the delegation and insisted that only the group’s chief himself must appear to address the 11 critical financial queries raised in the company’s audited statements.

The lawmakers described Ojulari’s continued absence as a direct affront to the authority of the National Assembly and a breach of its oversight responsibilities.

The committee’s chairman, Aliyu Wadada, therefore, warned that the Senate would not tolerate further disregard and vowed to issue a new date for the NNPCL GCEO to appear in person.

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Earlier, the Senate had cautioned that failure to respond adequately to its summons could result in the invocation of its constitutional powers, including the possibility of sanctions.

The committee clarified that it is not accusing NNPCL of stealing the mentioned amount; rather, it is only calling for accountability.

“First and foremost, there was never a period that this committee said the NNPC stole N210 trillion. But this committee said, and it still stands by it, NNPC must account for the N210 trillion. And the reason being that you submitted through your audited financial statement.

“And for crying out loud, no accrued expense by simple principle of accounting is considered and accepted as an accrued expense without passing through the profit and losses P&L. On your P&L, the accrued expenses reflected was and is still, I think, 3 trillion or 5 trillion. But on the audited financial statement issue, it came up to N103 trillion.

“We could not place the 103 trillion. By your records and your presentation, it could not be substantiated. So as far as we are concerned, that does not stand as a liability figure” Wadada said.