P&ID Scandal: Adoke Drags AGF, Abubakar Malami Before London Court Over Defamation Of Character

FORMER Nigerian Attorney-General of the Federation, Mohammed Adoke, has asked a London court to order redaction of witness statements attributed to him by his successor, Abubaker Malami in the P&ID trial.

Filing an application of defamation at the Commercial Court of the Property and Business Courts of England and Wales in London stating some referenced portions of Malami’s witness statements filed in defence of Nigeria’s case at the court as defamatory and malicious against him.

He also urged the court to delete the alleged “offensive” portions of the said statements.

The nine-page application, titled, ‘False evidence about Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN, in the P&ID case being heard in England’, stated that Malami in the statements filed at the London court “repeatedly described” Adoke “as corrupt”.

Delivered by his lawyer, Paul Erokoro (SAN), Adoke asked Malami to retract some referenced portions of his statements, tender an apology for the alleged damage done to his name by the claims, and pay monetary compensation for the alleged harm, which should be done within seven days.

His letter cited multiple portions of Malami’s witness statements, where the former AGF was accused of “thinly” defending Nigerian interest at the P&ID arbitration hearing “with a view to ensuring an award in P&ID’s favour”.

Malami had filed the two statements as a witness in defence of the Federal Government at the London court on December 5, 2019, and March 6, 2020, seeking to have the $9.6 billion arbitral award issued against Nigeria and in favour of a British Virgin Island firm, Process and Industrial Development.

He denied all the corruption allegations including the one in which he was accused of benefitting from the alleged fraudulent Malabu Oil deals.

Adoke who described Malami’s statements as constituting an act of abuse of his office informed the London court that the allegedly offending comments would lead to a miscarriage of justice in his defence of the criminal charged preferred against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC in Nigeria.

“That the conduct of the Honourable Abubakar Malami as HAGF in submitting the offending statements contained in the fourth and sixth witness statements will result in a miscarriage of justice.

“In my defence of the criminal charges filed against me in Nigeria as the conduct of the HAGF clearly an abuse of office by his breach of section 36(6) of the 1999 constitution of Nigeria in breach of his oath of office,” a section of the application reads.

He also denied all the corruption allegations including the one in which he was accused of benefitting from the alleged fraudulent Malabu Oil deals.

“The N300 million that is alleged that I have received from Malabu Oil was, in fact, a mortgage loan that I took from Unity Bank Plc in Nigeria to buy a house in Abuja with the purchase price of N500 million, and that when I could not raise the balance of the purchase price of N200 million after the initial payment of N300 million with the mortgage advance secured from Unity Bank Plc.

“The vendor sold the property to the Central Bank of Nigeria for N500 million and refunded part payment of the purchase price of the property paid with the mortgage advance of N300 million secured by from the Unity Bank Plc in the discharge of my mortgage,” the application read.

The P&ID case attained crisis levels for Nigeria last year when a UK judge ruled that P&ID could enforce an arbitration tribunal’s 2017 ruling, now adding $9.6 billion including interest, which found the country breached the agreement.

Nigeria’s chances of annulling the giant penalty lie on proving the 2010 gas supply arrangement was a sham designed to fail by P&ID and government officials.