By Kayode Sanni-Arewa
President Bola Tinubu has approved a request by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Ltd to utilise the 2023 final dividends due to the federation to pay for petrol subsidy, TheCable can report.
The president also approved the suspension of the payment of 2024 interim dividends to the federation in order to augment NNPC’s cash flow.
In addition, the national oil company told the president it will be unable to remit taxes and royalties to the federation account for now because of the subsidy payments, which it termed “subsidy shortfall/FX differential”.
An NNPC forecast seen by the newspaper showed that the cumulative petrol subsidy bill from August 2023 will hit N6.884 trillion by December 2024 — leaving the national oil company unable to remit N3.987 trillion in taxes and royalties to the federation account.
NNPC is expected to pause the payment of interim dividends for eight months this year — from May to December.