Another $500 million
loot will soon be repatriated to the country, Minister of Justice and
Attorney General of the Federation Abubakar Malami said yesterday.
He spoke after the
Federal Executive Council meeting at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
Nigeria has
engaged other countries, including the UK, US, France and others, in further
negotiations relating to repatriation and I am happy to report that we are
almost concluding the processes relating to the repatriation of
additional $500 million,”Malami said.
Malami said this is in
addition to the $322 million released by Switzerkand after negotiations.
He said: “you will
recall that in December 2017, the federal government participated in
a global forum on asset recovery in Washington DC during
which Nigeria and Switzerland signed an agreement that paved the
way for the repatriation of $322 million.”
He added: “What
transpired was only reported back to the council today. The report today was
not only about the signing of the agreement but the report of the eventual
repatriation of the amount of money that was signed and agreed to be
repatriated during the forum”.
He added that FEC also
approved N500 million for lawyers who represented the Federal Government towards
recovering N330 billion from telecoms giants, MTN.
He said: “FEC approved
the payment of professional fees to lawyers engaged by Federal
Government relating to the MTN case instituted against
the Federal Government in pursuance of penalty of over N1 trillion
imposed by the government on MTN.
“MTN as you will
recall, instituted a case seeking to restrain the federal
government from recovering the over N1 trillion imposed on it.
“The federal
government engaged the services of lawyers to put up defence, the case was
eventually settled by the parties amicably and arising from that settlement,
the lawyers were entitled to their fees.
He said the amount
approved for payment is less than one percent of the fee instead of theinternationally recognised
fee which is pegged at five per cent.”
On the posthumous
awards given to June 12 heroes, he said “I think we need to make distinctions
between the Nigeria National Merit Award Act and the Nigerian
National Honours Act. They are two distinct and different applicable
laws as far as National honours awards are concerned.
“You have the National
Merit Award on the strength of which the law of the governing board comes into
effect and then as it relates to the National Honours Act, the board
does not have any relevance in terms of processing of the Honours.
“For then, above all,
we equally have in existence, precedence as it relates to the award of
posthumous Honours. I can recall that a former Head of State, General
Murtala Mohammed was equally honored posthumously, among others.
On Public holidays,
Malami explained that “there is truly a Public Holiday Act, but it is in the process of
amendment. So, when the Act has been fully amended, the declaration of the
President will come into effect. It is a declaration of intention, a
declaration of desire and that will eventually be given effect with the
amendment of the existing law.”
The Nation
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