₦airaland Forum

United States Senate
PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS
Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
*** Carl Levin, Chairman
Tom Coburn, Ranking Minority Member
KEEPING FOREIGN CORRUPTION OUT
OF THE UNITED STATES:
FOUR CASE HISTORIES
MAJORITY AND MINORITY
STAFF REPORT
PERMANENT SUBCOMMITTEE
ON INVESTIGATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE

The Subcommittee contacted Siemens about this allegation and also reviewed the
Citibank account records. The Subcommittee identified Citibank records showing three wire
transfers from Siemens AG, in 2001 and 2002, that together provided over $1.7 million to
Ms. Douglas’ personal checking account at Citibank. This chart identifies those wire transfers.

173

V. ABUBAKAR CASE STUDY:

USING OFFSHORE COMPANIES

TO BRING SUSPECT FUNDS INTO THE UNITED STATES

Jennifer Douglas Abubakar, a U.S. citizen, is the fourth wife of Atiku Abubakar, the
former Vice President of Nigeria and a former candidate for the Presidency of Nigeria. This case
history examines how, from 2000 to 2008, Ms. Douglas helped her husband bring over $40
million in suspect funds into the United States, including at least $1.7 million in bribe payments
from Siemens AG, a German corporation, and over $38 million from little known offshore
corporations, primarily LetsGo Ltd. Inc., Guernsey Trust Company Nigeria Ltd., and Sima
Holding Ltd.

Over half of the suspect funds, nearly $25 million, were wire transferred by the offshore
corporations into U.S. bank accounts opened by Ms. Douglas. For most of the time period
examined, [b]the U.S. banks with those accounts were unaware of Ms. Douglas’ PEP status, and
allowed multiple large wire transfers into her accounts from the offshore corporations. As, over
time, each of the banks began to question the wire transfers into her accounts, Ms. Douglas
indicated that all of the funds came from her husband and professed little familiarity with the
offshore corporations actually sending her money.[/b]


Bank records indicate that Ms. Douglas used most of the funds placed into her accounts
to support a lavish lifestyle in the United States, paying credit card bills and household expenses
in the range of $10,000 to $90,000 per month, including substantial legal and accounting bills.

B. Using Offshore Corporations To Bring

Suspect Funds Into the United States


From 2000 to 2008, Mr. Abubakar and Ms. Douglas used a network of accounts at U.S.
financial institutions to bring over $40 million in suspect funds into the United States through
multiple wire transfers supplied by offshore corporations located in Germany, Nigeria, Panama,
the British Virgin Islands, and Switzerland. Nearly $25 million of those funds were wire
transferred to more than 30 U.S. bank accounts opened by Ms. Douglas in her own name or in
the name of the Jennifer Douglas Abubakar Family Trust, the Gede Foundation, or American
University of Nigeria (AUN). She opened 18 of those accounts at Citibank, four at Chevy Chase
Bank, six at Wachovia Bank, and three at Eagle Bank in Maryland, among other financial
institutions. These four banks opened accounts for Ms. Douglas in most cases without being
aware of her PEP status


For most of the seven years, Citibank was unaware of Ms. Douglas’ PEP status. In 2007, Citibank learned
of Ms. Douglas’ PEP status, and began closing her accounts. By August 2007, all of her
accounts were closed

Siemens Payments. As explained earlier, in December 2008, the U.S. Department of Justice
(DOJ) and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed criminal and civil pleadings
alleging that Siemens AG had violated the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and
engaged in a wide-ranging pattern of paying bribes to foreign officials to advance its interests in
several countries.1092 Siemens pled guilty to violating the books and recordkeeping requirements
of the FCPA.1093 One provision in the SEC complaint alleged as follows


“[A]pproximately $2.8 million of the bribe payments was routed through a bank account in
Potomac, Maryland, in the name of the wife of a former Nigerian Vice President. The Vice
President’s wife, a dual U.S.-Nigerian citizen living in the United States, served as the
representative of a business consultant that entered into fictitious business consultant
agreements … but did no actual work for Siemens. The purpose of these payments was to
bribe government officials. Other corrupt payments included the purchase of approximately


The Subcommittee contacted Siemens about this allegation and also reviewed the
Citibank account records. The Subcommittee identified Citibank records showing three wire
transfers from Siemens AG, in 2001 and 2002, that together provided over $1.7 million to
Ms. Douglas’ personal checking account at Citibank. This chart identifies those wire transfers.

What is PPE?


Politically exposed person

For most of the seven years, Citibank was unaware of Ms. Douglas’ PEP status. In 2007, Citibank learned
of Ms. Douglas’ PEP status, and began closing her accounts. By August 2007, all of her
accounts were closed

I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States
of America, by the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the
laws of the United States, including section 212(f) of the Immigration and
Nationality Act of 1952, 8 U.S.C. 1182(f), and section 301 of title 3, United
States Code, hereby find that the unrestricted immigrant and nonimmigrant
entry into the United States of persons described in section 1 of this proclamation
would, except as provided in sections 2 and 3 of this proclamation,
be detrimental to the interests of the United States.
I therefore hereby proclaim that:

Section 1. The entry into the United States, as immigrants or nonimmigrants,
of the following persons is hereby suspended:
(a) Public officials or former public officials whose solicitation or acceptance
of any article of monetary value, or other benefit, in exchange for
any act or omission in the performance of their public functions has or
had serious adverse effects on the national interests of the United States.
(b) Persons whose provision of or offer to provide any article of monetary
value or other benefit to any public official in exchange for any act or
omission in the performance of such official’s public functions has or had
serious adverse effects on the national interests of the United States.
(c) Public officials or former public officials whose misappropriation of
public funds or interference with the judicial, electoral, or other public
processes has or had serious adverse effects on the national interests of
the United States.
(d) The spouses, children, and dependent household members of persons
described in paragraphs (a), (b), and (c) above, who are beneficiaries of
any articles of monetary value or other benefits obtained by such persons.


https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2004-01-14/pdf/04-957.pdf

Odingo1:
This guy cannot sleep because of Atiku visa to US, them swear for your head....Nawaoooo.

If Atiku come win the election you kill yourself for nothing, na poor people like this one dey die for rich APC and PDP politians that is looting oil money.

Wachovia told the Subcommittee that when it later asked CDC why it had failed to
identify Ms. Douglas as a PEP, CDC indicated that it had been identifying individuals as PEPs
only if an individual was the primary focus of a press article, and Ms. Douglas had not met that
criterion.1198 As a result of the Douglas incident, Wachovia told the Subcommittee that CDC had
changed its policy and is now identifying individuals as PEPs even if an individual is not the
primary focus but is mentioned in a press article. In addition, according to Wachovia, CDC did
not conduct a search for negative press articles with regard to Ms. Douglas when it performed its
due diligence review and so did not find the articles linking her to the investigation of

JusticeSeeker:
Of all contestants, was this the only man pdp saw to nominate as their presidential candidate?

socialmediaman:
I’m beginning to wonder if some people are under undue pressure to justify some posting allowance. Flooding nairaland with long epistles seems like trying to force people to read what they’ve already seen a couple times before.