A South Supreme Airlines plane | Credit | Courtesy

The proprietor of South Supreme Airlines has denied that his company illegally benefited from money meant for oil-producing state and communities.

Ayii Duang Ayii was responding to the Auditor-General’s report that accused the company of being one of the illegal beneficiaries of oil money meant for communities of producing states.

A report last month by the National Audit Chamber revealed that several companies and individuals benefited from the 5 percent meant for oil-producing states and communities.

It said in 2015, South Supreme Airlines, owned by businessman Ayii Duang Ayii received $4.1 million to buy an aircraft from money allocated for community development projects.

Reacting to the report, Ayii said the money he received was for goods worth millions of dollars he had supplied to the army in 2013.

“This money belongs to South Supreme Airlines for doing some work for the ministry of defense,” Ayii said.

He explained that the defense ministry wrote to the ministry of finance to pay $4,130,000 from their account. Then the ministry of finance issued 4 cheques from account number 24 in the central bank.

But only one cheque amounting to $700,000 was withdrawn but the remaining three cheques worth $3,400,000 were rejected because the amount wasn’t sufficient in the acconut.

“We discovered that ministry of finance had withdrawn the amount from the central bank. We opened a police case. Then the prosecutor general wrote to the central bank which wrote back statement to the general prosecutor to explain the rejection of the three cheques,”Ayii explained.

According to Ayii Duang, the money he received is even less than what he demands from the ministry of defense.

He says he supplied to the defense ministry items including fuel and food during the 2013 crisis.

Eye Radio has seen a letter from the Ministry of Defence and Veterans Affairs to the Ministry of Finance in 2014 to pay the amount of 4,130,000 US dollars to South Supreme Airlines.

Another letter on 26 December 2013 issued by the SPLM Directorate of Military Intelligence requested 26 Antonov planes for transportation of soldiers and other assorted supplies.

Mr. Ayii says up to now, he has not received full payment for his services because two of the three cheques issued by the defense minister had bounced.

According to the businessman, he was sent to the minister of finance to amend the cheques but when the documents returned, “the account was already empty.”

He told Eye Radio that in February 2016, he opened a police case against the Bank of South Sudan and the Ministry of Finance for the three cheques which had bounced.

“All I know is that we received cheques from the ministry of finance under account number 24. We only withdrew from one cheque but the other three cheques, they kept telling us to renew. And up to now, we are still waiting for the 2021 budget.”

The bussinessman added that his company “has nothing to do with account number 24 which is allocated for funds of oil-producing states and communities.”

The National Audit report was on the Accounts of the 2% and 3% of net oil revenue of oil-producing states and communities.

It discovered that over $50 million, part of 2% and 3% shares meant to be paid to oil-producing states was misappropriated.

After the report, the finance ministry said it was enforcing reforms to ensure transparency in the management of revenues.