the government of President Muhammadu Buhari to
"thoroughly investigate the role and involvement of
the World Bank in the repatriation, management and
spending of repatriated Abacha stolen funds and
other similar funds with a view to ensuring full
transparency and accountability in these
transactions."
The report also calls on the World Bank to "publicly
disclose the level of involvement of the bank in the
repatriation of Abacha stolen funds and other similar
funds to Nigeria, and its role on the management and
spending of such funds, as well as the projects on
which the funds were spent. The World Bank should
publicly disclose its involvement in any other ongoing
repatriation initiatives to Nigeria, and the
mechanisms it is putting in place to ensure
transparency and accountability of such mechanisms
and the judicious use of repatriated funds."
The report also urges the Buhari government to
"revisit and challenge in court unfair Settlements in
Bribery Cases by successive governments and
repatriation agreement between the government of
Goodluck Jonathan and the family of the late General
Sani Abacha dated 14th July 2014 and other similar
dodgy and unfair agreements with a view to getting
better deals, receiving damages/compensations from
companies such as Halliburton, and achieving justice
for the Nigerian people."
The 37 pages report launched today at the Westown
Hotels, Lagos is titled: Deterring Kleptocracy: Finding
Nigeria's Re-Stolen Billions and Repatriating Looted
Assets. It discloses that over $3 billion recovered
Abacha loot; $87 million stolen funds by the former
Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun and over
$20 million stolen funds by former governor
Diepreye Alamieyeseigha among others may have
disappeared or been mismanaged by successive
governments, and called on the Buhari government
to thoroughly investigate the management and
spending of the stolen funds.
The report highlights some of the missing recovered
funds to include: $1,000,000,000–Swiss' government
Mutual Legal Assistance, up to 2012; $800,000,000 –
General Abubakar-led domestic recovery, 1999;
$233,795,000– Principality of Liechtenstein's returned
funds, June 2014; $198,484,000 – Ajaokuta Steel Plant
debt buy-back case, 2003; $160,000,000– Jersey's
global asset recovery for Nigeria, 2003; and
$36,016,200 –Jersey's recovered funds from Mr.
Bhojwani, 2012.
Adetokunbo Mumuni, SERAP executive director said:
"President Buhari should make sure that never again
will the prerogative of mercy be used to save corrupt
officials and grant impunity for corruption as it was
done by the former President Goodluck Jonathan
with respect to corruption cases against Diepreye
Alameiseigha."
"The constitution imposes some ethical conditions on
the president to ensure that the exercise of the
discretionary power of prerogative of mercy is not
such that it will encourage corruption or provide an
escape route for perpetrators," Mumuni also said.
The report accused former President Goodluck
Jonathan of "playing a major role in dislocating the
efforts made by his predecessors. There are
indicators that informal arrangements were made
with his administration to scuttle the asset recovery
process, including negotiating a cancellation of all
civil litigations against the Abacha family. In addition,
during the Jonathan administration, former governor
Alamieyeseigha was granted state pardon without
serving the full terms for crimes worth millions of
dollars in state funds."
The report also asks the government to "consistently
utilise the crime of illicit enrichment (also called:
"unexplained wealth," or "inexplicable wealth," or
"disproportionate wealth.") to facilitate recovery of
stolen assets by high-ranking officials. The illicit
enrichment offense criminalizes the "unexplained
increase in the wealth of a public official while in
office. It targets a significant increase in the assets of
a public official that he or she cannot reasonably
explain in relation to his or her lawful income,
essentially deeming a public official's unexplained
accumulation of significant capital to be a form of
corruption."
"The use of the crime of illicit enrichment is a
proportionate and measured response to the
pernicious problem of corruption in Nigeria. More
than 40 nations, including Argentina and India have
successfully used the crime of illicit enrichment to
fight corruption and money laundering and there is
no reason why this should not be at the forefront of
the asset recovery initiative by the Buhari
government," the report states.
The report also asks the Buhari government to:
1. Improve upon and vigorously enforce laws on financial disclosure to require government officials to annually disclose and widely publish information about their income, assets, liabilities, and positions held outside public office
2. Establish and maintain a public income and asset declaration database for the President and Vice President and senior public officials (those who would qualify as politically exposed persons), to assist banks in identifying the proceeds of corruption
3. Establish mechanisms or expand the mandates of the Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption to include oversight functions over anticorruption agencies, in particular the EFCC, the ICPC and the Code of Conduct Bureau and Code of Conduct Tribunal and where appropriate provide the necessary frameworks to make this happen
4. Set up a Looted Asset Fund in the Presidency or Ministry of Finance to provide a framework that would allow the appropriate and transparent management of the proceeds of corruption recovered by the government.
5. Explore the possibility of referring cases of those suspected of corruption in the military budget to prosecute the conflict with Boko Haram to the International Criminal Court, including under Article 8(2)(a)(iv) on the extensive destruction and appropriation of property; and Articles 8(2)(b)(xvi) and (e)(v) on pillage of the ICC Rome Statute.
6. Put in place mechanisms to achieve the effective implementation of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act and the UN Convention against Corruption
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