House of Representatives Thursday
set up an ad-hoc committee to investigate the circumstances surrounding the
engagement of Oladipo Okpeseyi and Temitope Adebayo for $16.9 million for the
recovery of the $321 million being part of Abacha loot from Luxembourg.
It also urged president Muhammadu
Buhari to suspend the payment of the said whooping sums of money or any part
thereof pending the outcome of its investigation spanning for a period of six
weeks.
These resolutions followed an
adopted motion sponsored by Hon. Mark Terseer Gbillah.
In his lead debate, Gbillah
pointed out that Mr. Enrico Monfrini, a Swiss lawyer was engaged by the
Nigerian government since 1999 to work on recovering the Abacha loot for which
the sum of $321 million was a part and had finished the Luxembourg part of the
job since 2014 when Mohammed Bello Adoke was the Attorney-General of the
federation.
He further affirmed, ” that Mr.
Mofrini had since been paid by the federal government for his legal services
for the recovery of the money which was then domiciled with the
Attorney-General of Switzerland pending the singing of an MOU with Nigeria to
avoid the issues of accountability around previous recoveries”.
The lawmaker also declared that
all that was left was the singing of the said MOU, saying it was a government
-to-government communication for the money to be repatriated to Nigeria.
It was at this juncture that the
lawmakers wondered why the current minister of Justice and Attorney-General of
the federation, Abubakar Malami should curiously engage the services of the two
Nigerian senior advocates for $16.9 million without due process.
The House also noted that the two
senior advocates had worked for Buhari and the defunct Congress for
Progressives Change, CPC, when Malami also served the party as legal advisers,
hence the motion and the unanimous resolutions.
Besides, Gbillah said actual work
had been concluded by Monfrini and that he had been paid by the Nigerian
government and, that the terms of agreement reached with Mofrini spelt out that
no other lawyer would be further engaged for the return of the money to
Nigeria.
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