Few weeks after President Muhammadu Buhari declared that all government ministries, departments and agencies comply with the Treasury Single Account (TSA) policy by September 15, there are reports that he has exempted 13 profit-oriented organisations including the Nigerian National Petrol Commission (NNPC) and the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN). Interestingly, other agencies reportedly tabled an appeal to be exempted but only few MDAs were granted exclusion from the TSA policy.


Other agencies that were supposedly exempted include: Transcorp Hilton Hotel, Niger Delta Power Holding Company, Urban Development Bank, Nigerian Import Export Bank (NEXIM), National Integrated Power Project (NIPP), Galaxy Backbone, Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria, Bank of Agriculture, Bank of Industry (BOI) and Ajaokuta Steel Company.

The reports claimed a circular, dated September 14, 2015, “Approval to Exempt Some MDAs In line With the E-Collection Mop-Up Exercise”. The exemption was said to have been passed to the office of the Director, Central Bank of Nigeria and signed by the acting AGF, M.K Dikwa.

However, there are also reports that the Director of the Central Bank of Nigeria debunked the exemption of some agencies at the end of a Monetary Policy Committee Meeting by insisting that no agency has been exempted from the open accounting system. He also dismissed accepting any memo from the AGF’s office and asked rumour peddlers to put an end to the confusion while urging the agencies to put more efforts towards compliance.

Although there are conflicting reports the surrounding the exemption list, it has raised questions around the president’s possible change in directives when he made it clear earlier the need for the policy to be adopted by all MDA’s. One of the reasons was to improve accountability of revenues and enable proper monitoring of cash flow. The supposed exclusion of these entities undermines the main objectives of the policy.

The Nigeria National Petrol Corporation, one of the agencies on the list, manages the government’s interest in Nigeria’s oil industry and has a long history of corruption and unaccountability. The organisation allegedly engages in illegal deductions of state funds, and false subsidy claims. Earlier in the year, the Central Bank of Nigeria accused the corporation of its inability to account for $20 billion amongst other allegations of false subsidy charges in 2007 and 2009. The corporation is also one of the MDA’s that found it difficult to meet up with the deadline set by the president earlier in the month.

Notably, the federal government recently confirmed that 600 out of 900 MDAs are now in compliance with the TSA while others are struggling to comply at different stages of the exercise. This is a positive development towards full implementation of the TSA scheme.

The policy holds promises of discipline and high level of efficiency in MDA’s, but if there are exemptions of major agencies, the federal government is mandated to clarify its reasons for such action. Why should some agencies be excluded from complying with the open account policy while others are left to go through the heat? If these allegations are indeed true, they pose a setback on the government’s fight against corruption.
Culled from Ventures Africa.