The police in Italy have launched an inquiry into Nigeria’s most infamous deep water oil block, OPL 245.
By this action, they join the British, who in July last year also began a
probe of the allegation that money laundering may have been involved in
a $1.3 billion Nigerian oil bloc deal involving Royal Dutch Shell and
Italy's Eni SpA.
According to previous newspaper reports in Nigeria, the two companies
are alleged to have paid as much as $1.092 billion to the Nigerian
government, using a JPMorgan Chase Bank in London. The government had a
parallel agreement to pay the money to Malabu Oil and Gas, which
belonged to former Petroleum Minister Dan Etete, according to a report
of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).continue...
The money paid to Malabu Oil & Gas was then shared by some
private companies belonging to certain officials at the very heart of
the Jonathan presidency.
Last July, a British High Court ruled that Etete was indeed the owner
of Malabu Oil & Gas. In effect, while he was a Minister under
General Sani Abacha, Etete had cleverly acquired the lucrative OPL 245.
Last month, an adhoc committee of the House of Representatives set up to
investigate the 2012 sale of the oil block to Shell and Eni recommended
that the government should revoke the licence, arguing that the
agreement violated Nigerian law.
Sources in Italy now say that the prosecutor’s office in Milan say
the track of the money paid by Eni became known because of civil cases
between Malabu Oil & Gas and mediators (Russian Agaev and Zubelum
Chukwuemeka Obi, a Nigerian).
The account further says that that in May 2011, a bonus of $205
million was paid to the Nigerian government of Nigeria to cover up
disputes relating to the ownership of the block 245.
Although the announcement from the Italian Prosecutor’s office in
Milan said there are no suspects yet, they are relying on wiretapping
obtained from several Italy-based ENI subjects namely : Henry John
Woodcock, Francesco Curcio, Paulo Scaroni, Luigi Bisignani and Eni 's
General Manager Claudio Descalzi.
In March 2011, President Goodluck Jonathan ordered the sum of
$1.1billion paid to Malabu oil company account by ENI AGIP and Royal
Dutch Shell, the monies were then shared by entities close to President
Jonathan, in particular the Attorney General of the Federation, Mohammed
Bello Adoke was fingered directly as Mr. Jonathan’s front in receiving
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