Nigeria’s Former minister of petroleum has offered to refund $250m to President Muhammadu Buhari’s government in exchange for immunity from further investigation and possible prosecution.
However, all her overtures has been rebuffed by the President. According to SaharaReporters, former minister has been reaching out to influential government and ruling party officials, in and outside Abuja, to prevail on President Buhari to accept her offer and let bygones be bygone. Mrs. Alison-Madueke had enlisted the support of several figures close to Mr. Buhari, including Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State, to intercede with the incumbent president.
Mrs. Alison-Madueke was one of the closest ministers to former President Goodluck Jonathan, and is reputed to have anchored and facilitated numerous money-laundering scandals and deals that characterized the era of the just-ended Jonathan administration. The former Petroleum Minister oversaw several oil swap deals, the disposition of oil wells handed over by Shell Petroleum to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), and the direct looting of funds through the NNPC. Former Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, was forced out of office after he revealed that the NNPC had failed to remit more than $20 billion in oil revenues with the CBN.
The former Petroleum Minister is the latest of several officials who served under Mr. Jonathan’s government that are currently negotiating “soft landing deals” with the Buhari administration. The incumbent president, who was sworn in on May 29, 2015, has vowed to probe various questionable financial actions taken by his successor or officials of his government. Mr. Buhari is reportedly determined to recover billions of dollars in stolen funds.
One source said Mrs. Alison-Madueke’s latest offer to refund at least $250 million to the government came after she learned that President Buhari’s scheduled meeting with US Attorney General, Loretta Lynch, would include a discussion of ways that the US government could facilitate the investigation, arrest and prosecution of some officials of the Jonathan administration implicated in the theft of billions of dollars and a variety of frauds that resulted in the loss of significant sums of public funds in Nigeria.
One source according to SarahaReporters disclosed that Mr. Buhari was unimpressed by Mrs. Alison-Madueke’s offer. “Mr. President considers the $250 million as ridiculous considering the amount of money Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke is suspected to have diverted into her pocket and those of others,” said one source.
According to our sources, Mr. Buhari is intent on ordering a full audit of deals and transactions done by the former Petroleum Minister and her cohorts in the various agencies that reported to her.
In addition, the new president is reportedly focused on looking further at the extensive embezzlement of security funds by appointees of the former president. Mr. Buhari has approved an investigation of how more than $3 billion in Nigeria’s defense budget was spent. Security agents who searched the homes of former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, reportedly carted away some revealing documents.
