A NEW offensive directed at multinational corporations and their home countries linked with various bribery scandals has been initiated by the Federal Government to curb corruption in Nigeria.
The exercise, which is being handled by the office of the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, is basically pro-active in its entirety as it is designed to stem the tide of losses Nigeria suffers from such contract scams.
So far, some American and European multinationals have been named in connection with bribery in Nigeria and the Federal Government is gathering its facts for evidence to sue them for damage done to Nigeria through the dirty deals.
The companies are Wilbross and Halliburton (American), and Siemens of Germany.
The firms are at the centre of various alleged bribery scams in Nigeria’s telecommunications, oil and gas sectors.
A source in the Attorney-General’s office told The Guardian at the weekend that Nigeria has lost untold sums in cash and in reputation through such fraudulent transactions. Indeed, Nigeria is hoping to reap not less than $10 billion if the action is successful, being the calculable sum the nation has lost as a result of the scams.
The source said the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Chief Michael Aondoakaa (SAN) had put forward the argument that the country has suffered losses on three fronts: perception/humiliation, discrimination in the world of business, and colossal economic and financial losses.
Consequently, the official said the AGF’s office is set to file actions against the companies involved in such bribery scandals on their own soil or in the world’s financial centres, where they are very active.
Aondoakaa, it was learnt, would leave Nigeria for London tonight to set the stage for the early filing of charges against the companies.
Aondoakaa, it is said, has also set up an exploratory team of three lawyers, including Damian Dodo, Mohammed Dele Belgore and one M.S. Ambey, all Senior Advocates, to begin the process of liaising with top law firms across the world’s major centres with a view to getting the companies to pay for the damage done to Nigeria.
The action against the companies may begin in the next three months, The Guardian learnt.
The cocktail of scandals that hit contract business in Nigeria began with Halliburton, a U.S. company, which allegedly paid $180 million to some Federal Government officials, to win bid for the construction of the first two trains of the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) plant in the late 1990s.
The scandal came to the public domain after a French court launched an investigation in October 2003, over allegations in respect of unwholesome conducts of some officials of the company.
Halliburton allegedly admitted in a regulatory filing with Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of USA, that improper payments to Nigerian government officials might have been made in order to win the LNG contract.
The company was also earlier alleged to have admitted that an internal probe suggested that members of the TSKJ consortium, which it leads, might have bribed government officials.
But the Nigerian officials allegedly named in the scam were not prosecuted despite the assurance given in 2004 by the Federal Government that the matter had been handed over to the then newly-inaugurated Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
When the French investigation began in 2003, Halliburton said it was innocent of the allegation, since the alleged bribe occurred before its’ acquisition of Kellog Brown & Root (KBR).
Halliburton was also said to have instructed its representatives in the country to submit the names of the Nigerians allegedly involved in the scam to government.
Following this revelation, the House of Representatives Committee on Public Petitions that investigated the matter in August 2004 recommended that all companies linked with TSKJ and Halliburton in Nigeria should be excluded from new contracts until its investigation was completed.
Indications, however, emerged recently that Halliburton had agreed to pay $559 million to settle federal charges for its employees’ bribing of officials in Nigeria.
The settlement, still awaiting formal approval from the U.S. Department of Justice, would be the biggest fine by a U.S. company in a bribery case, topping the $44 million that Baker Hughes Inc. paid last year in relation to charges that it paid bribes in Kazakhstan.
Penalties for bribery and corruption offences have been increasing worldwide with Siemens, the German conglomerate, agreeing to pay $800 million (GBP564 million) to settle U.S. allegations regarding payments to government officials in several countries to win infrastructure contracts.
The Anglo-Dutch giant, Shell was also implicated in the bribery scandal. Indeed, there were revelations that some officials of Shell Development Corporation, SPDC may have benefited from the allegation of $6 Million bribe allegedly distributed by Willbross Group to secure contract for the Eastern Gas Gathering System, EGGS, in Nigeria.
Documents obtained revealed that some officials of Shell had promised to help Willbross Group secure and retain the plum contract.
The EGGS phase 1 contract price was approximately $216.5 million. The EGGS coating optional scope price was approximately $30 million while EGGS phase 2 price was estimated at $141` million.
The former General Manager of Wilbross International, Mr. Jason Edward Steph, is at present facing prosecution under the Foreign Corrupt Act for being the mastermind that distributed $6 million to some senior officials of Federal Government, the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) stalwarts, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS) and SPDC.
The German telecommunications giant Siemens was alleged to have paid more than $100 million in bribes to officials in Nigeria, Russia and Libya.
A German court in Munich had named some past Nigerian ministers of communications as well as a Senator as having received bribes of about 10 million Euros from the German engineering conglomerate.
The court, in an October 4 ruling, listed Maj.-Gen. Tajudeen Olanrewaju, Dr. Bello Haliru Mohamed, Chief Cornelius Adebayo and the late Alhaji Haruna Elewďż˝, as well as Senator Jibril Aminu, among the alleged bribe recipients.
The court indicted Siemens for offering 77 bribes to cabinet ministers in Nigeria, Libya and Russia, to win lucrative contracts.