The Senate Committee on Public Accounts yesterday gave the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC), three weeks to respond to queries raised against it in the audit reports of 2017 to 2023.

Chairman of the Committee, Senator Ahmed Wadada (Nasarawa West) gave the order when the Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPC Ltd, Engineer Bayo Ojulari, finally appeared before the committee after several summons by the lawmakers.

The three-week window, Wadada said, is to enable Ojulari to explain the circumstances surrounding the discrepancies in the accounts of the company, particularly the N210 trillion said to be unaccounted for in the report of the Auditor General of the Federation.

Ojulari, who apologised to the committee for his inability to honour their invitations earlier, pleaded that he needed more time to prepare his response to the 19 queries raised against the NNPC Ltd in the said audit report.

He said: “I’m just over 100 days in the office as the GCEO of NNPCL. I still need time to do further digging, given the perspectives I have heard now, into the issues.

“I need to understand the issues myself so I can respond appropriately. “Will get a team and please get the details properly reconciled so we can work to provide answers to the queries.”