By Gideon Njoku
Diezani Alison-Madueke, Nigeria’s former Petroleum Resources Minister, has distanced herself from the $52.8 million loot returned to Nigeria from the United States of America.
On January 10, 2025, the Nigerian Government had announced that the loot, recovered from the sale of Galactica is linked to the former Minister.
The recovery of the loot quickly dubbed Diezani Alison-Madueke loot was announced by Nigeria’s Attorney General and Minister for Justice, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, during a formal signing ceremony for its return in Abuja.
But in a statement, the former Petroleum Resources Minister under the Government of President Goodluck Jonathan, strongly denied she has anything to do with the loot. On the contrary she said in the statement issued on her behalf by the Chambers of her Attorney, Professor Mike Ozekhome, SAN, Diezani who, since she left office lives in London, disclosed that the returned funds belong to Kola Aluko, a Nigerian entrepreneur who deals in oil. Any connection to Diezani, the statement said, is unfounded and malicious and cruel.
Titled “There is no such thing as Diezani Loot.”, the
statement from Ozekhome Chambers reads:
“My Chambers makes this intervention in the public domain as Solicitors to Diezani Alison-Madueke (DAM) ,the former Minister of Petroleum Resources, HMPR.
“As her Solicitors, we are fully versed in, and conversant with her present ordeal and the entire facts surrounding her matters both here in Nigeria and abroad. So, we write from the vantage position of one that is aware of the cocktail of lies that have been spurned around her cases in the last ten years.
“Many of the narratives are outrightly false; some others sheer outlandish speculations; and most, simply bizzare stories cooked up by her traducers to extract a Shylock’s pound of flesh from her for reasons she does not know and cannot even fathom.
“This intervention, therefore, seeks to correct this skewed narrative and set the records straight for purposes of history. Many Nigerians often talk about wanting ‘technocrats’ to be involved in governance. They desire that people with character and integrity should join politics.
“We agree with them. However and regrettably too, now and again and many a time, the same people not only allow, but actually join the bandwagon to mob-lynch those who chose to serve the nation.
“And we often do this insidiously, covertly and overtly, even when there is no concrete or even any iota of proof that such public officers ever abused their offices or stole from public coffers.
“It is therefore surprising and of great concern to us, to see the level of sustained vilification of an innocent Nigerian citizen who has not yet been tried and found guilty of any offence known to law by any court of law whether in Nigeria or abroad. The person at the receiving end is Citizen Diezani Alison-Madueke (DAM)
“We note with concern the recent deliberate attempt to link her with what has been described as a civil forfeiture of a yacht Galactica, the sale of which was said to have yielded $52.8m to the US government; which sum has since been repatriated to Nigeria.
‘This is a clear example of the mischievous and cruel sport of tarnishing the image of the lady through a bouquet of consistent, persistent and unrelenting cocktail of falsehoods and misinformation.
“The purveyors of this line of misinformation term it ‘name-and-shame’. To sell the storyline, the architects ensured they attached Diezani’s name to a recovered yacht which is not in any way linked to her.
“They now falsely termed it “Diezani loot”. Nothing of the sort ever happened. She was never been involved in the purchase, use and sale of the said yacht.
“The yacht Galactica, from information readily available in the public domain and in open sources, was purchased by Mr Kola Aluko who had used the vessel until he agreed to its forfeiture to the United States of America.
“The yacht Galactica was neither owned nor ever used by our client. DAM has, in fact, never set her eyes on the yacht. Kola Aluko is an experienced businessman who had been in business well before DAM came into office as HMPR.
“The only tenuous basis for deliberately linking DAM to the said yacht is the false narrative that the Strategic Alliance Agreements (SAAs) which were entered into between Kola Aluko & Jide Omokore’s Atlantic Energy companies and NNPC, were allegedly corruptly awarded to the said companies by DAM.
DAM was not the GMD of the NNPC and so, did not and could not have awarded the said contracts.
“We plead, as her lawyers, with all and sundry that she be accorded fair hearing and that the process of these UK court proceedings be allowed to take their natural course to avoid prejudice to her in the ongoing subjudice UK proceedings against her.
”Those purveyors and peddlers who habitually spin these outrightly false, unfounded, defamatory, unintelligent and indefensible narratives to denigrate and humiliate her should please find better use of their time and leave DAM alone.
“Let the law take its natural course without interference. We humbly pray.”
Fagbemi, Attorney General of the Federation and Minister for Justice, had disclosed that $50 million of the funds would be channelled through the World Bank for rural electrification projects, while the balance of $2.8 million would go to the International Institute of Justice to support anti-corruption initiatives.
Diezani has been in the storm since she left office at the end of President Jonathan’s Government in 2015.
Discover more from The Source
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
