Nigeria is looking for the extradition of former oil minister and the
first female president of OPEC from the UK to face trial in her home
country, because a corruption investigation in Britain is taking too
long, the head of Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission
(EFCC) said on Monday.
Diezani
Alison-Madueke served as petroleum minister of Nigeria between 2010 and
early 2015 under then Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, until he
was defeated in the elections by current president Muhammadu Buhari in
2015. Alison-Madueke was also the first female president of OPEC.
She was arrested in 2015
in London as part of a two-year-long investigation by the UK National
Crime Agency (NCA) into global corruption, bribery, and money
laundering. Alison-Madueke was released on bail after being questioned.
She has been on bail ever since, according to AFP.
Police
and investigators suspect that Alison-Madueke was involved in siphoning
off billions of U.S. dollars from Nigerian oil deals and state accounts
when she was overseeing Nigeria’s oil industry, for personal benefits,
including for buying luxury homes in London and in Nigeria’s capital
Abuja.
More than two years ago, a Nigerian ad-hoc parliamentary
committee revealed that there were no formal contracts between the
Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and trading companies
that received $24 billion worth of Nigerian crude oil between 2011 and 2014.
According
to the results of the investigation, Alison-Madueke illegally allowed
for a swap of Nigerian crude oil for refined products to trading firms
Duke Oil and Trafigura.
The former Nigerian oil minister denies wrongdoing. Now Nigeria seeks extradition from the UK to put her on trial at home.
EFCC’s
chairman Ibrahim Magu told a news conference in Abuja on Monday that
“It is very unreasonable that she is not being tried there,” referring
to the UK.
“That’s why I say, if you cannot prosecute her, bring
her here. We will prosecute her... We cannot wait endlessly like this. I
think three years and above is sufficient to take her to court,” AFP
quoted Magu as saying.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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