by Azeez Adeniyi

The House of Representatives ad hoc Committee investigating the alleged stolen 17 billion dollars oil and gas sales on Thursday ordered Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Godwin Emefiele, to appear before it within seven days.

The committee threatened to arrest Emefiele if he fails to honour the invitation.

Chairman of the Committee, Abdulrazak Namdas said the Central Bank has provided conflicting responses to its inquiry on the matter.

“We have sent two different letters to the CBN and the bank has provided two conflicting responses to our inquiry.

“In response to the first letter, the apex bank pleaded for time due to the volume of documents required but in response to the second letter, CBN indicated that it has no record of undeclared crude,” Namdas said.

Namdas warned that the committee will punish anyone who attempts to delay or frustrate the investigations.

“We expected him to be here and he is not, we are disappointed.

“We will not allow any agency of government to delay the committee’s work.

“If in the next one week, the CBN Governor did not appear before this committee, we will not hesitate to exercise our powers in line with section 88 and 89 of the 1999 constitution.

“Most of the international oil companies have furnished us with the information needed but CBN is very vital and key to this investigation and we cannot jump the gun,’’ he said.

Azeez