Again, federation accounts committee meeting ends in deadlock

• Govt’s bond offer oversubscribed by N6.7b
The monthly meetings of the Federation Accounts and Allocation Committee (FAAC), yesterday, ended in deadlock over alleged controversy in remittances from the nation’s oil agency.The meeting had only lasted for two hours before the disagreement alleged to be between the Nigerian National Petroleum Cooperation (NNPC) and the committee members over figures ended the forum.

Consequently, angry states’ representatives, comprising commissioners and states accountants- general dispersed, with obvious distraught, as they refused to speak to journalists.This is the second time in the recent months, when the meeting would end similarly, with the major issues bearing on NNPC’s remittances.

A reliable source, who was at the meeting, confided in journalists that the rancour was caused by the low and poor figure reported by the NNPC just like it did two months ago, which was rejected.One of the representatives only muttered, saying: “We are going to meet our governors,” without saying anything further.Officials of the Federal Ministry of Finance at the meeting told journalists that a new date would be called in the next two days.

The source said: “It is our friends at the Towers again! They have done it again! What they submitted was rejected and that’s why everyone is angry. We are going to see our governors, after which we will meet the Finance Minister and see how we can resolve this.”Meanwhile, the Debt Management Office (DMO), yesterday, said the Federal Government’s bond offer was oversubscribed by N6.7 billion.

The development is an indication of rising confidence in the economy and investors’ readiness to stake more in the country, according to the debt manager.DMO had offered N60 billion bonds in three tenors- five years, seven years and 10 years, but investors’ bid recorded N66.7 billion.According to DMO, the oversubscription was recorded despite the foreign exchange auction worth $210 million, which ran simultaneously and mopped up over N65 billion from the market.

In addition, the CBN also mopped up over N200 billion from the system through the sale of Open Market Operations (OMO) on Monday.“The forex sale and the OMO auction reduced the quantity of money in circulation and pushed up interest rates.However, to moderate debt-service costs, DMO adopted a conservative approach by allotting only N31.2 billion at rates between 13.50 per cent and 13.81 per cent,” the Director-General of DMO, Ms. Patience Oniha, said.The DMO is the government’s debt agency, which raises fund using debt instruments to support deficits in the yearly budgets of the Federal Government.