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UK authorities have charged Nigeria’s former petroleum minister with bribery following a long-running investigation in a case that could shed light on how lucrative contracts in Africa’s largest oil producer were awarded.
Diezani Alison-Madueke, who served as oil minister from 2010 to 2015 and was elected president of the Opec oil producers’ cartel in 2014, is accused of taking bribes for awarding multimillion-dollar oil and gas contracts, according to Britain’s National Crime Agency (NCA).
The NCA said in a statement on Tuesday that Alison-Madueke, a prominent member of former president Goodluck Jonathan’s administration, is alleged to have been the beneficiary of “at least £100,000 in cash, chauffeur-driven cars, flights on private jets, luxury holidays for her family and the use of multiple London properties”.
Alison-Madueke also received furniture, renovation work and staff for those properties, private school fees payments and luxury gifts from Cartier and Louis Vuitton, the NCA alleges.
Alison-Madueke, who has been living in London since she left office, is scheduled to appear at Westminster Magistrates Court on October 2.
The NCA said assets worth millions of dollars had already been frozen as part of the investigation.
“We suspect Diezani Alison-Madueke abused her power in Nigeria and accepted financial rewards for awarding multimillion-pound contracts,” said Andy Kelly, head of the NCA’s International Corruption Unit.
“These charges are a milestone in what has been a thorough and complex international investigation.”
Alison-Madueke has been the subject of corruption allegations in multiple jurisdictions since she departed office in 2015 following Jonathan’s election loss. The NCA said it provided evidence to the US Department of Justice in March that led to the recovery of assets worth $53.1mn linked to her alleged criminality.
She has previously denied any wrongdoing.
Alison-Madueke was oil minister when Nigeria’s then central bank chief Sanusi Lamido Sanusi claimed in 2014 that tens of billions of oil proceeds had gone missing from the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.
Alison-Madueke was arrested in 2015 in the UK, although the reasons for her detention were never made public.
