$15m IBORI BRIBE MONEY AWARDED TO FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

The legal battle over the controversial $15m Ibori bribe money ended on Friday as an Abuja Federal High Court ordered that the amount should be forfeited to the Federal Government.

This followed the court’s rejection of the claim made by Delta State Government.

The court, presided over by Justice Gabriel Kolawole, held that Delta State was not able to prove its claim that the money belonged to it.

The $15m was said to have been received by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission from an undisclosed agent of the former Delta State Governor, James Ibori in 2007 as a bribe to compromise its investigation into his financial dealings, while in office from 1999 to 2007.

The money has been kept with the Central Bank of Nigeria as an unclaimed property since August 2007, but a legal battle ensued over its ownership, after the court had on July 24, 2012, granted an interim order forfeiting the cash to the Federal Government.

While the Federal Government, through the EFCC lawyer, Rotimi Jacobs (SAN), asked the court for a final order of forfeiture so that the money could be deposited in the national treasury, Delta State filed an application, claiming that the money belonged to it.

Meanwhile, the Federal Government said it would keep the money in a consolidated revenue fund to be used for the wellbeing of Nigerians while the state government expressed a wish to use it to provide infrastructure in the state.

The Federal Government’s main argument against the claim made by Delta State was that the state government had washed its hands off the $15m when it resisted investigations into corruption allegations against Ibori by deposing to an affidavit stating that it had not lost any money.

The Federal Government stressed that the then Attorney-General of Delta State had filed an action against the EFCC and the Attorney-General of the Federation, stating that the state government’s account should not be investigated in line with the anti-graft agencies investigations into allegations of financial impropriety leveled against Ibori.

And in his judgement on Friday, Justice Kolawole agreed with the Federal Government.

He equally held that Ibori had earlier denied reports that the $15m cash emanated from him, a development which undermined Delta State’s claim that the money was from its coffers.

Delta State’s Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Charles Ajuyah (SAN), who was the state’s counsel, had told the court to take a cue from previous instances when money recovered from two other governors – Joshua Dariye of Plateau State and Dipreye Alamiesiegha of Bayelsa State – were returned to the states.