Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), has vowed to prosecute former President Olusegun Obasanjo and other past leaders, private individuals and corporate entities that connived to sabotage the country’s economy.
Malami who spoke at an event the Federal Ministry of Justice organised to celebrate his re-appointment, warned that President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration “cannot afford to fail on account of lawless acts of corrupt and unpatriotic few who always derive pleasure in seeing us fail as a nation.
“The law must work; it must speak its firm language of justice at all times no matter whose ox is gored.”
Malami said that his first line of action would involve the prosecution of every person and institutions that engaged in what he described as underhand dealings that led to the August 16 ruling of a court in the United Kingdom that ordered seizure of $9billion in Nigerian assets.
“Sadly, in spite of the spirited and concerted efforts of the current administration to combat corrupt practices and rent seeking in all its forms, Nigerians woke up on Friday, August 16, 2019, to the rudest consequences of the underhand dealings of the past administration that has resulted in the award of $9 billion against the Federal Republic of Nigeria by a British court which ruled that Process and Industrial Development Limited, P&ID, had the right to seize $9billion in Nigerian assets.
“It may interest you to know that the dispute that led to the arbitration between the FGN and P&ID which consequently resulted in the said court ruling arose from a 20 year Gas Supply Processing Agreement, GSPA, purportedly entered with P&ID by the past administration in 2010 which contract P&ID never performed as agreed.
“That being said, it must be placed on record that the Federal Government strongly views with serious concerns the underhand manners by which the negotiation, signing and formation of the contract was carried out by some vested interests in the past administration in connivance with their local and international conspirators all in a bid to inflict grave economic adversity on the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the good people of Nigeria.
“As a government that has the mandate of the people, and their interests at heart, we shall not fold our arms and allow this injustice to go unpunished as all efforts, actions and steps shall be taken to bring to book all private individuals, corporate entities and government officials, home or abroad and past or present that played direct and indirect roles in the conception, negotiation, signing, formation as well as prosecution of the purported agreement.”
He decried the fact that the country is bedeviled with an existential crisis of nationhood that is threatening to tear it apart, “with needless calls for separation, dismemberment and ill-motivated restructuring”, blaming it on “long years of failure of our justice system”.
He said the Ministry of Justice would rigorously pursue judicial reforms targeted at protecting the sovereignty and integrity of the country, as well as promote the policy thrusts of President Buhari’s administration.
Malami said the administration had in its bid to further recover proceeds of corruption, decided to fully activate the provision of section 15 of the Money Laundering (Prohibition) Act. 2011 (As Amended), against private individuals and corporate entities culpable of concealing, disguising, converting, transferring, hiding, removing from the shores of Nigeria, acquiring, using, retaining or taking possession or control of any fund or property they knowingly or reasonably ought to have known to have formed part of the proceeds of unlawful acts.
“As bad news to the rogues within our financial system, in the next four years, the Federal Ministry of Justice, in collaboration with anti-corruption agencies, shall be beaming anti-corruption searchlight on the financial institutions (F18) and Non Designated Financial Institutions, DNFIs, in order to make them pay dearly for the dastardly role they have played and are still playing in encouraging and deepening corruption in Nigeria.
“From arms procurement fraud, INEC bribery case to Diezani case and several others, quantitative data available to the Federal Government abundantly shows that financial institutions are directly involved in most of the major corruption cases investigated by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, and Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission, ICPC, from 2015 till date.”
He said that the Justice Ministry would equally support the development and promotion of appropriate executive bills capable of achieving the objective of combating systemic and grand corruption ravaging the country.
“Where necessary, the Ministry shall initiate necessary executive orders to close apparent gaps in the anti-corruption initiatives currently in place in Nigeria. To compliment this, we shall be improving on the Ministry‘s asset recovery drive through collaboration with relevant stakeholders, and leveraging technology for greater efficiency; development of a culture of cohesive synergy among the three arms of government.’’
