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Aiteo Chief Executive Officer, Benedict Peters, is the latest Nigerian oil mogul to be named in the case surrounding the bribery allegations against former Nigerian Oil Minister, Diezani Alison-Madueke.

Three London properties linked to the alleged bribery of Mrs. Alison-Madueke have been frozen under the UK Proceeds of Crime Act, at least one of which is owned by Mr. Peters.

The order, issued in September 2016 and obtained by Africa Confidential, forbids defendants Benedict Peters, Mrs. Alison-Madueke, Atlantic Energy’s Kola Aluko and Jide Omokore, Christopher Aire (a jeweller for Mrs. Alison-Madueke) and Donald Amamgbo (her cousin) from disposing of or dealing with the properties.

Messrs Alison-Madueke, Aluko and Omokore were named in the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DoJ) asset forfeiture, which stated that the same London properties totaling more than £10m were bought for the oil minister in order to secure lucrative Strategic Alliance Agreements (SAAs), which saw prized Nigerian oil assets passed to the minister’s cronies for pittance.

Mr. Peters’ company Aiteo has been linked to the 2015 INEC bribery scheme that saw Mrs. Alison-Madueke’s son, Ugonna Madueke, distribute $115million to INEC officials via Fidelity Bank in 2015.

But the inclusion of Mr. Peters as a defendant in the London case, which relates to an attempt to influence the former Minister’s contracting decisions, suggests that international investigations could be more wide ranging than was previously known.

Mr. Peters’ company, Aiteo, did not directly benefit from the SAAs, but it flourished under Mrs. Alison-Madueke’s oil ministry. As well as term contracts from the NNPC, Aiteo benefitted from the oil swaps, and bought Shell’s prize asset, OML 29. With Peters now in the frame, these deals could face the same scrutiny from international law enforcement as the notorious Atlantic SAAs.

Mr. Peters has admitted to being the owner of the Seychellois company, Rosewood Investments Limited, who until now has been known as “co-conspirator #2” in the DOJ’s case. Rosewood Investments bought the £2.8m luxury flat in Harley House, London, in March 2011, with the help of London-based estate agent Daniel Ford.

Mr. Peters later bought luxury furnishings for the flat from Mrs. Alison-Madueke’s favourite Houston store, according to the US documents. The DoJ affidavit says over the course of two days in May 2011, Mr. Peters bought over $107,000 of furniture – including a sideboard worth more than $10,000 – that was later shipped to the UK and installed at Harley House.

Construction workers renovating Harley House over the summer of 2011 were introduced to Mrs. Alison-Madueke as “the architect”, and Kola Aluko, who was co-ordinating the renovation of Harley House in the summer of 2011, forwarded the plans for the apartment to the former minister.

Mr. Peters could not be reached to comment for this story. All his known telephone lines were switched off the multiple times PREMIUM TIMES called in three days. He is yet to respond to an email inquiry sent to him.

An official of his Sigmund Group, who was contacted by telephone, said he could not speak for Mr. Peters, and would not provide his latest contact details.

Diezani’s deals: the swaps and the blocks

The Swaps

Mr. Peters ran tank farms under the aegis of Sigmund Communnecci Limited until 2008, when a “re-branding” exercise renamed the company to Aiteo. Its success under the Goodluck Jonathan government has made it perhaps Nigeria’s largest indigenous oil and gas company.

Aiteo entered into its first offshore processing agreement (OPA) contract with Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation’s Duke Oil in 2010 which gave the company 30,000 barrels of oil a day. Under the contact terms, Aiteo was supposed to refine the crude and import a set value of oil products in return. That deal was periodically renewed, but it was not renewed in 2014.

In January 2015, Aiteo received another OPA deal (90,000 barrels per day) directly from NNPC, but the contract was cancelled by the Buhari administration. That same time, the company took over Duke Oil’s 30,000 barrels per day OPA. The deal was also cancelled shortly afterwards.

Former Governor of Central Bank, Lamido Sanusi, published an explosive memo in 2014 that pointed to possible NNPC losses of $20billion between January 2012 and July 2013, and listed the oil swaps as potential leakage points. Experts pointed to numerous loopholes in the contracts that could have cost NNPC millions – including a clause stating that records relating to the contract could be disposed of after a year.

President Muhammadu Buhari cancelled the swap contracts as soon as he assumed the Nigerian presidency in 2015, but it took until March 2017 for Aiteo to repay $202m in “reconciliation” charges – and there has been little transparency over how this figure was arrived at.

The Blocks

By arguably the most lasting deal that Mrs. Alison-Madueke presided over during her time at the oil ministry was the sale of Shell’s onshore assets in the Eastern Niger Delta. The jewel in the Shell’s divestment portfolio was the Nembe Creek Trunkline, a critical crude oil pipeline that takes crude from the Delta to Bonny Export terminal – and the OML 29 oil block.

The Aiteo consortium was announced as the highest bidder for the most valuable block, OML 29, in March 2014, just a month after Sanusi’s memo was published.

Aiteo and its partners, Igho Sanomi’s Taleveras and a little known trader, Tempo Energy, bid $2.85m for the block, which commentators considered inflated. None of the companies had experience of production, and Shell encouraged the consortium to join up with a company that did.

It took over a year to for the deal to be completed, and in that time, Shell’s Chief Financial Officer warned investors that it was “difficult to predict” how the company would get approval of the sales from the government. Under the Petroleum Act the Minister has power of approval for the sale of oil licences in which NNPC has stake.

The purchase of the block was finally completed just days before the 2015 election, financed by Citi Bank, First Bank, Zenith Bank, and Union Bank Nigeria. The CBN demanded the reclassification of the loan in summer 2016 – as the Nigerian banking sector reached near crisis because of its exposure to Jonathan era deals.

The transaction was also partly funded by $512m of “seller financing” from Shell – under which Shell retains the exclusive rights to market oil from the block for the first five years.

Source: PREMIUM TIMES

BIG STORY

JUST IN: Tinubu Directs Immediate Release Of Minors Facing Prosecution

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Nigeria’s President, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has directed that all the minors arrested and facing prosecution in court over their alleged involvement in the #EndBadGovernance protest should immediately be released without prejudice to the law.

This follows the national outrage and international consternation that trailed the trial of the minors.

President Tinubu also directed the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction to see to the welfare of the minors.

The Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, disclosed this while briefing State House correspondents, in Abuja.

The Minister said that the President said all the law enforcement agents involved in the arrest, detention and prosecution of the minors be investigated and anyone found culpable, would face appropriate disciplinary action.

 

More to come…

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Court Orders Arrest Of Dana Airline MD, Hathiramani Ranesh, Over Alleged N1.3 Billion Fraud

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A Federal High Court in Abuja has issued an arrest warrant for the Managing Director of Dana Air, Mr. Hathiramani Ranesh, due to his alleged failure to appear in court.

The Attorney General of the Federation had filed a six-count charge against Ranesh and two others.

In count one, Ranesh and the two companies, alongside others at large, were alleged to have committed a felony between September and December 2018 within the premises of DANA Steel Rolling Factory in Katsina. They were accused of conspiring to remove, convert, and sell four units of industrial generators “i.e. three (3) units Ht of 9,000 KVA and 1 unit of 1,000 KVA; all valued at over N450 million, which form part of the Deed of Asset Debenture that were charged as collateral security for a bond issued in your favour, which Deed is still subsisting at all material times.”

In count three, the defendants and others at large at House No. 116, Oshodi-Apapa Expressway, Isolo-Lagos between April 7th and 8th, 2014, were alleged to have conspired to fraudulently divert the sum of N864 million.

This amount was said to be part of the bond proceeds from Ecobank meant for the resuscitation of production at Dana Steel Rolling Factory in Katsina for other unapproved uses.

In count five, the defendants and others at large were alleged to have “conspired to fraudulently remove and transfer to one Atlantic Shrimpers Account No: 0001633175 with Access Bank and divert the sum of N60,300,000 (Sixty Million Three Hundred Thousand Naira).”

The total amount involved in the charges is N1,374,300,000.

Justice Obiora Egwuatu ruled that Ranesh’s arrest was necessary after he was served with charges and failed to attend multiple court proceedings.

The judge noted that according to Section 184 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA), 2015, the court is authorized to issue an arrest warrant for any defendant who does not show up.

Justice Egwuatu stated, “The 1st defendant is bound to appear before the court, and if he does not, the court can issue a warrant for his arrest.” Consequently, he issued a warrant for Ranesh’s arrest, requiring him to appear in court on January 13, 2025, before any objections can be addressed. The case has been adjourned until that date for further hearing.

The Federal Government’s attorney, Mojisola-Okeya Esho, had previously requested the bench warrant, citing Ranesh’s absence in connection with a N1.3 billion fraud case against him.

However, defense lawyer B. Ademola-Bello contended that they had filed a preliminary objection regarding the court’s jurisdiction to hear the case, which had already been served to the prosecution.

Esho opposed the preliminary objection, asserting that the defendants should be present. Justice Egwuatu, who gave his ruling, ordered that Ranesh be arrested and brought to court on the nexta djourned date.

 

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JUST IN: President Tinubu Swears In Seven Ministers

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Nigeria’s President, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has sworn in seven ministers-designates.

The ceremony was held in the council chamber of the Aso Rock villa on Monday.

The ministers-designate were confirmed by the senate in the committee of the whole after a screening exercise last week.

The senators spent hours asking them questions on portfolios assigned to them by the president.

The upper legislative chamber confirmed Nentawe Yilwatda as minister of humanitarian affairs and poverty alleviation, Muhammadu Maigari Dingyadi as minister of labour and employment, Bianca Odumegwu-Ojukwu as minister of state for foreign affairs, and Yusuf Abdullahi Ata as minister of state for housing and urban development.

Others are Idi Mukhtar Maiha as minister of livestock development, Jumoke Oduwole as minister of trade and investment, and Suwaiba Said Ahmad as the minister of state for education.

About two weeks ago, Tinubu sacked five ministers and asked the senate to screen and confirm these new ones to fill vacant and new portfolios in his cabinet.

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