₦airaland Forum

ABUJA—The Federal Government moved a notch higher in its anti-graft war, last night, with a confirmation that it was launching a comprehensive probe into the controversial Halliburton bribery case in which top Nigerian politicians allegedly received huge bribes in the region of N66 billion.

The bribes were taken by top players in government between 1994 and 1998 from five major companies that were awarded $6 billion for the construction of gas trains in Bonny Island in Rivers State for the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas Company, NLNG.

Under the fresh probe being ordered by the Buhari administration, and unlike in the past, the key players in the Nigerian government, who demanded and collected the huge sums of money and those who offered the bribes, are to be fished out and prosecuted.

Vanguard also learned that the Federal Government was keen on determining if, indeed, the sum of $200 million said to have been paid by the five companies, which were indicted over the scam, was indeed remitted into the purse of the government.

The fresh enquiry will also ascertain why five senior Nigerian lawyers, who negotiated with the indicted multinational firms to escape prosecution in Nigeria and paid the $200 million fines, collected close to $12 million as ‘legal fees’ from the fines.

The Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. Abubakar Malami, who confirmed the fresh probe being launched by the government in an interview with Vanguard last night, said both criminal and civil charges would be pressed against the suspects.

Malami, who is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, said nothing would be left to chance in the new attempt to investigate the multi-million Naira scam that had cast the nation in bad light in the international community.

Leaving nothing to chance

Malami said: “It is true that the federal government is undertaking a comprehensive probe of the Halliburton bribery scandal and we are not leaving anything to chance this time around.

“The recent invitation of some persons for questioning by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission,EFCC, in connection with the bribery, is the beginning of the fresh effort to unravel all the issues related to the case and it is going on as planned.

“I want to say that if we need to proceed with criminal prosecution after our investigations, we will do that, and if we need to go for recovery and prosecution, we will do so. Nothing will be left to chance,” the minister said.

Asked to confirm the receipt of $200 million fines said to have been paid by the five multinational companies into a dedicated Federal Government account with the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, as declared last week by one of the lawyers, Damian Dodo, Malami said the investigation would establish the whereabouts of the said money.

The minister said that all claims related to the matter would be unravelled by the probe currently going on but did not name all the agencies involved in the current probe apart from the EFCC, which has already quizzed two of the five lawyers, who handled the case.

The immediate past AGF, Mohammed Adoke, in 2010, raised a five-man legal team to prosecute the companies indicted in the scam and they all opted to pay huge fines instead of being tried in Nigeria.

The legal team raised by Adoke was led by the then President of the Nigerian Bar Association, Joseph B. Dauda, with Mr. Emmanuel C. Ukala, Chief Godwin Obla, Roland Ewubare and Damian Dodo as members.

The companies which were involved in the bribery scandal and opted for payment of heavy fines and non-prosecution by Nigeria, were: Halliburton Energy Services, Siemens AG, TSKJ, Technip of France, Snamprogetti of Italy, Kellog, Brown and Roots of the U.S and Japan Gas Corporation and Julius Berger, which was accused of acting as a conduit for the illegal transfer of $5 million.

To avoid prosecution, JB immediately opted to pay a fine of $35 million to Nigeria and accordingly, let off the hook.

aresa:
[s][/s]



[s]Not interested in your fraudulent iPOd nonsense..

Na by force[/s]?

banmee:
[s]And this is why i say your mentality is a problem. You are looking at a picture of an air craft using tape to hold a compartment up. The question you should be asking is if they can cut corners there, where else could they be cutting corners? This is why it was ok for Nigerians to board an aircraft with a ladder. They did it because they had a mentality like yours. I have flown in and out of multiple countries and in all my travels i have never seen the deplorable standards that exist in Nigeria. The standards In Nigeria exist because of people like you who see nothing wrong it[/s].

banmee:
[s]And that mentality is the reason you and so many Nigerians are living in bondage. The things you should question you let slide. Soon, after a while, you'll start to ask how and when did things get so bad. Suffer no good i swear. It destroys the way people think[/s].

banmee:
[s]Have you asked that what else might be on the plane that they have used tape to hold together? Nigerians are so used to below par standards[/s].

RICHIEBOI1:
This is what i saw when i boarded an airline yesterday.. I wont mention the airline. What ever happened to safety standard.. Smh

aresa:
[s]Another Judas.... Nigeria is fully protected and covered with anti evil machinations by evil people like you and your kind.[/s].

Babacele:
[s]a digital computer whose program like dasikugate,defencegate,malabugate was bleeding us to death. Of course if this Daura Analogue can save us from the 16 years extinction program initiated by the virus PDP in 8 years, we shall be grateful. you all can cry till 2019 before we take an half gaze at your crooked faces n if we ain't convinced ,u all shall b sentenced to another four years of una mess clearing. Una go cry tire. we go teach una commonsense.[/s]

tuale4u:
Mtcheww

MabraO:
[s]These waiters don't just give up
How many of Jonah daft campaign promise did he fulfill?[/s]

Adaure4ever:
exactly. Btw is timi ur name?
Is that a Nigeria name?

aresa:
[s][/s]




[s]Nigerians put PMB in office to do what's best for Nigeria regardless of your usual pointless and thoughtless #PDPhouseOfhunger gyration...

Nigerians kicked jona out of office and elected PMB because of institutionalized looting, stealing, corruption and incompetence, not because of your silly 5000 naira..

Stop boring us with your sociopathic worries..

[/s]

Adaure4ever:
I may be naive about political issues, correct me if I made a mistake somewhere in this post. but I want to ask that :
Had it been that it was Goodluck jonathan that promised the #5000 money for unemployed and failed to pay it.
- will he not be criticized by APC and their members? Will Lie Mohammed and El rufai not be abusing him now?
.. Buhari should apologize for promising things that he can't fulfill.
Am still waiting for One dollar to 1naira that APC promised.
Thankz.

aresa:
[s]You just can not miss the presence of the usual judas in nearly all these anti Nigeria ramblings.....


This is how much they hate Nigeria[/s].

appini:
Nice one, this is how Lie Mohammed started. Kontinu

ubah84:
evil people from d evil region who are afraid of change

ISpiksDaTroof:
[s]All you have to do is look at the names of the authors and contributors of the article.[/s]

Keneking:
Nonsense media agency

KINGinVAHALA:
This is rubbish!

FG must not kill only rev king, they must kill all igbos along with him.

waldigit:
Pardon me, this is not a place for sane people. Out of here, run! run!!!