Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, director-general of the World Trade
Organisation (WTO), says her life was threatened for saving Nigeria huge sums
of money from oil subsidy scam while serving as the country’s finance minister.
Okonjo-Iweala served as finance minister under the
administrations of former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan.
Speaking during an interview organised by Atlantic Council,
a United States think-tank on international affairs, on Tuesday, the WTO DG
said her life was threatened for doing her job.
Okonjo-Iweala said during Obasanjo’s administration, she
worked to ensure renegotiation of Nigeria’s debt in the international
community.
She said Nigeria was indebted by $30 billion to the Paris
Club with a debt service of $2 billion a year, of which the country could only
pay $1 billion.
The former minister said the country’s debt was later
systematised with the help of good reforms.
During the period, Paris Club reached an agreement to grant
relief of about $18 billion (60 percent) on the $30 billion owed, which lowered
Nigeria’s external debt from $35.94 billion in 2004 to $20.48 billion in 2005.
During Jonathan’s administration, Okonjo-Iweala said her
effort was directed at tackling corruption and improving the financial system
with the use of technology.
“And just by having an integrated financial management
system, we were able to cut down on the phenomenon of ghost workers, you know
where people used to put additional people on the payroll in the ministries,
ghost pensioners, because ghost workers will graduate to ghost pensioners, and
so we got rid of that and saved $1.1 billion for the government,” she said.
“So that is, we were fighting other types of corruption. We
had an oil subsidy system in which we used to pay marketers.
“Oil marketers who brought in refined oil, you know, we paid
them the difference between the market price, and the subsidised price that the
government was mandated for selling oil to people.
“And so, that was when I came the second time. This was a
big problem. When I left government the first time in 2006, these subsidies
were about $2 billion, when I came back, the first thing we noticed was that it
had grown to $11 billion.
“So, I asked President Jonathan that we could audit the oil
accounts which he fully supported. When we audited, $8.5 billion of the
accounts, we found $2.5 billion of fraudulent claims and with his backing, we
refused to pay that to the marketers and that led to a series of problems,
which I won’t bore you with, including threats to my life.
“My mother being kidnapped for five days was one of the
worst periods of my life and it was a very tough period.
“But, that being said, I think the privilege of serving my
country as finance minister for several years, to being able to work on some
reforms is one of the best things I’ve ever done.”
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