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Accuses ADC Candidate of Bribery, Wired Fraud in Mambilla Power Project Scandal
- Safiu Kehinde
The All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council has labelled the 2027 African Democratic Congress (ADC) Presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, unfit to contest over alleged involvement in bribery and wired fraud linked to the Mambilla Power Project scandal.
Atiku was accused of collecting $500,000 bribe from Sunrise Power and Transmission Company Ltd (Sunrise) and one Leno Adesanya to approve a Build-Operate-Transfer contract to a company with no scintilla of experience in hydro power generation.
The allegation emanated from an old case filed before the International Arbitration Tribunal in Paris in 2003.
Citing the case in a statement issued on Friday, the spokesman of the President Bola Tinubu Campain Council, Dele Alake, narrated how Atiku and his former wife, Jennifa Douglas, had allegedly conspired with Sunrise and Adesanya who later dragged the Nigerian government before the arbitration tribunal after their deal collapsed.
Alake accused Atiku of going the directive of former President Bola Tinubu to initiate the deal.
“Abubakar’s legendary corruption reverberated in Paris at the International Arbitration Tribunal under the auspices of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC).
“Hearings in the arbitration filed by Sunrise Power and Transmission Company Ltd (Sunrise) and Leno Adesanya over the stalled 3960mw Mambila Hydroelectric Power Project in Taraba State revealed that Abubakar and former power minister Olu Agunloye worked in cahoots to sign an illegal power contract with Sunrise.
“The backdoor signing of the contract in the dying days of then President Olusegun Obasanjo’s first term, when Atiku wielded enormous power, put Nigeria in a serious financial peril, despite President Obasanjo’s objection and reservations at the Federal Executive Council meeting.
“Atiku’s greed, however, propelled him to disobey the council and President Obasanjo, months after Leno Adesanya, through an offshore account, China Castle Investment, wired $500,000 to the US Citibank account of his now-divorced wife, Jennifer Douglas.” He said.
The Minister of Solid Minerals Develo0ment further narrated how the wired fund drew the attention of the United States.
“The money arrived in tranches, raising red flags at Citibank and in the United States. The wired money and other suspicious transfers totalling $40 million surfaced in a US Senate investigation into Atiku and other corrupt leaders.
“In the US Senate report titled “Keeping Foreign Corruption out of the United States: Four Case Histories”, Jennifer said her husband sent the money. She said she was not familiar with the offshore company that wired the money.” He said.
Alake labelled the act a treasonable act as he alleged that Atiku proceed with the deal after the Nigerian government declined to go ahead with the illegal contract.
This according to the APC Presidential Campaign Council spokesman led Sunrise and Leno Adesanya to make a claim against the Federal Republic of Nigeria, demanding $680 million as a settlement sum and interest in respect of another arbitration in which it claimed over $2.7 billion in compensation and interest relating to disputes associated with the development of the Mambilla Hydro Power project.
Quoting a secruon of the case, Alake held thaf the ICC Paris Tribunal concluded that “There is a close connection in time between the moment the USD 500,000 payment was made to the wife of Vice-President Abubakar on 30 January 2003 and the alleged award of the BOT contract to Sunrise on 22 May 2003.”
He said Nigeria fought valiantly to dodge this huge liability.
The fight, according to Alake. echoed a similar attempt by another company, Process and Industrial Development (P&ID), to extract an $11 billion claim from Nigeria for a phantom gas project in Akwa Ibom that the company did not spend a dime on.
The minister held that by collecting a $500,000 bribe from Leno Adesanya to approve a Build-Operate-Transfer contract to a company with no scintilla of experience in hydro power generation, Atiku has proven he is one of the enablers of local and international predatory and exploitative entities out to defraud our country.
He recalled Atiku’s alleged reluctance yo appear before the international tribunal to give evidence on the allegation against him.
“At the hearing in Paris, Atiku, to avoid embarrassment, chose to stay away to give evidence in support of Sunrise and Leno Adesanya’s specious claim that the $500,000 was a foreign exchange transaction.
“Although the Tribunal requested Atiku’s witness statement, Adesanya shielded Atiku and Jennifer Douglas by lying.” He said.
Alake recalled how Obasanjo and former late President Muhammadu Buhari went to Paris to defend Nigeria and help stave off a liability that our country can ill-afford to redeem in these lean times.
He further cited one of Obasanjo’s publication where the former President discredited Atiku for allegedly betraying his trust.
“The disclosure in Paris once again justified President Obasanjo’s scathing remarks about Atiku’s corruption in his book, My Watch. “ What I did not know”, the former Nigerian leader wrote in the second part of the book, “which came out glaringly later, was his parental background, which was somewhat shadowy, his propensity to corruption, his tendency to disloyalty, his inability to say and stick to the truth all the time, a propensity for poor judgement, his belief and reliance on marabouts, his lack of transparency, his trust in money to buy his way out on all issues and his readiness to sacrifice morality, integrity, propriety, truth and national interest for self and selfish interest.” He wrote.
Alake charged Atiku to bow out of the presidential race as he described the bribery allegation as a tip of an iceberg amid other revelations to come.
“The APC Campaign calls on Abubakar Atiku to do himself a rare honour by bowing out of the presidential race, as the $500,000 bribe is just the tip of the iceberg of the revelations to come about his monumental corruption.
“The people of Taraba State should also note that the ADC candidate, who plans to pull wool over our eyes and bamboozle his way to the presidency as a pro-petrol-subsidy candidate, is one of the people responsible for the stalled kick-off of what would have been the biggest hydro-power project in Nigeria, with many economic spin-offs for the people of the state.” Alake wrote.