Ribadu's report is 'substantially ok' -- El-Rufai Part 4

Former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nasir El-Rufai on Thursday said the report on the operations on the Nigeria oil and gas sector presented by the Chairman of the Petroleum Revenue Task Force, Nuhu Ribadu is substantially satisfactory.

Speaking as a guest on Channels Television's breakfast programme, Sunrise Daily, the former minister said, though the report may have some shortcomings, the Federal government should not 'throw the baby with the bath water.'

Mr El-Rufai said: "That somebody submitted a report and said 'I have figures but you need to crosscheck them' does not make the report incomplete or useless."

He said the Federal Government should consider all the recommendations of the report and identify those that can be implemented.

"They should not question the integrity of the whole report just because a couple of members, clearly with interest, have spoken out against the report. The report is substantially ok. More than 20 members of the committee have not come out to disown the report. The other three have not written a minority report.

"Steve Oronsanye and Nuhu Ribadu are both friends of mine, but here I must say Steve is wrong to say that because of his fidelity to process as an accountant the whole report should be thrown out. I don't agree with that," he said.

The former minister insisted that there is no discrepancy between the two versions of the Ribadu report in circulation and that if the government implements the recommendations in the reports, the Nigeria oil and gas sector will be better managed.