On Thursday, January 28, Ibrahim Magu, the acting chairman of
Nigeria’s anti-corruption agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission (EFCC), received a letter.
The two-paragraph letter from the office of the Attorney General of
the Federation and Minister of Justice, made only one request from the
anti-graft chief. Signed by Muhammad Diri, the Director of Public
Prosecutions of the Federation, the letter asked Mr. Magu to forward
“the case diary in respect of investigation into” the OPL 245 Malabu
scandal.
The letter, which should normally be a routine one, caused a dilemma
to the EFCC chief. It put him directly in the middle of a conflict, a
senior government official called “cold war” between the Attorney
General Abubakar Malami, and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo.
The crux of the disagreement between the vice president and the
attorney general concerns what decision the administration should take
as it tries to resolve the fraud and controversy surrounding the
allocation of immensely rich OPL 245 to Malabu and its subsequent
assignment to oil majors, Shell and Eni.
PREMIUM TIMES had exclusively reported the recommendations made by
the justice ministry to the presidency regarding the resolution of a
long-drawn scandal which has given Nigeria a bad name, and is being
investigated by authorities in Italy, UK, Nigeria, and the U.S.
The recommendations
One of the recommendations which has since been accepted by the
Attorney General was for the nullification of the tripartite agreements
that ceded the oil bloc to Shell and Eni. The committee described the
agreements as “null and void”, saying it “should not be given any legal
effect by the FGN (Federal Government of Nigeria) as doing so would
amount to the FGN condoning and perpetuating illegality.”
Over $800 million of the money has since been paid into accounts
controlled by ex- petroleum minister, Dan Etete, with most of it
believed to have been distributed through phoney companies to top
Nigerian government officials, including Mr. Adoke.
Apart from calling for the cancellation of the agreements and the
retrieval of the bloc, estimated to contain about nine billion barrels
of crude, the justice ministry also called for the prosecution of both
Nigerian and foreign officials involved in the scam.
It also recommended that Shell and Eni be fined at least $6.5 billion
(five times the $1.3 billion Shell and Eni originally paid in 2011 the
block) for their roles. This, it stated, should be done “in accordance
with the relevant provisions of our laws in conformity with
international best practices via the appropriate courts (at) home or
abroad as the case may be.”
Although Mr. Malami is yet to formally advice the presidency on these
recommendations, multiple sources close to the Vice President said he
was already aware of them and agrees with all but one.
The disagreement
One of the major recommendations of the justice ministry was that the oil bloc return to Malabu.
“Properly speaking, in the eyes of the law, OPL 245 still belongs to
Malabu and was never fully transferred to Shell/Agip/Eni,” the
ministry’s committee that reviewed the case said in its report.
A lawyer who was involved in drafting the ministry’s recommendations
told PREMIUM TIMES that that conclusion was based on some
considerations: Malabu was the only one legally allocated the oil bloc
by Nigerian government; Mr. Etete who represented Malabu during the 2011
agreement was not a shareholder of the company and had no legal right
to do so, an information to which all the other parties including Shell,
Eni, and the Nigerian government were privy of; and past presidents,
including Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan, had all agreed Malabu
was the owner of the bloc.
“In fact, after a thorough independent investigation, the House of
Reps concluded that the oil bloc revert to Malabu, and wrote the federal
government on that,” the source, who asked not to be named as he was
not authorised to speak on the matter, said.
However, that recommendation has been rejected by both the Vice
President and the Presidential Advisory Committee on corruption, headed
by eminent law professor, Itse Sagay.
“That recommendation cannot stand,” a source close to the Vice
President said. “Malabu itself was registered falsely and it deceived
the government into getting the bloc. The bloc should return to the
government.”
PREMIUM TIMES had reported how Mr. Etete, as petroleum minister,
awarded the oil bloc to Malabu in 1998. He also created a fictional
character, Kwekwu Amafegha, to own 30 per cent shares of Malabu; the
other owners being Mohammed Abacha, son of late dictator Sani Abacha,
and Hassan Adamu, a former Nigerian Ambassador to the U.S. Mr. Etete
created the fictional director because he did not want to be seen
awarding an oil bloc to himself.
Controversy lingers
In explaining the Vice President’s stance on the OPL 245 saga, an
official close to him, who asked not to be named because of the
sensitive nature of the matter, said it was Mr. Sagay’s committee that
was directly assigned by President Muhammadu Buhari to look into the
case and report to the presidency on the matter.
He described the vice president office’s involvement as “informal”.
However, PREMIUM TIMES learnt that while the Malabu issue signposts
the conflict between the VP’s office and the justice ministry, there is
indeed a deeper turf fight between the two entities.
Sources at both the Justice Ministry and the VP’s office told this
newspaper that part of the recommendations of the presidential committee
was that a special prosecution team made up of private credible lawyers
be set up.
The team would report directly to the vice president, who himself is a
professor of law and former Attorney General of Lagos State. The team,
if approved by Mr. Buhari, would prosecute major corruption cases like
Malabu, and review pending ones like the Halliburton and Siemens
corruption cases.
“What is then the function of the Justice Ministry and all the
government lawyers being paid by the government,” an official of the
ministry close to the Attorney General said. “If the government thinks
they are not competent, why continue to pay them.”
Mr. Malami would not comment on the friction between his office and
that of the VP. He did not answer or return calls. Neither did he
respond to a text message sent to him. He was also not present in his
office when PREMIUM TIMES visited his ministry.
Magu’s dilemma
While the “cold war” persists, the EFCC chairman, Mr. Magu, is yet to provide the case file requested by the Attorney General.
His dilemma, insiders at the anti-graft agency say, is complicated
by the fact that about a week before the AGF’s letter, he received a
similar one from the Vice President’s office to which he already
replied.
The EFCC spokesperson, Wilson Uwujaren, denied knowledge of any of
the letters and would not comment on the status of the investigation
into OPL 245.
Mr. Diri, however, confirmed that the EFCC chief was yet to respond to the letter from his ministry.
And until Mr. Malami gets the case file, he as Attorney General and
Justice Minister cannot write President Buhari on his recommendations on
how to resolve the OPL 245 fraud.
The two oil firms had in 2011 agreed to pay to Malabu, through the
Nigerian government, the sum of $1.3 billion dollars for the bloc. While
the oil firms claimed at different times that they paid the money into
the Nigerian government account not knowing who the final recipient
would be, the former attorney general, Mohammed Adoke, who co-signed the
agreements on behalf of the federal government, said the government
only served as a mediator between two willing parties.
0 comments:
Post a Comment