President Muhammadu Buhari has issued a strong warning to international firms aiming to defraud the country (Nigeria), as he tagged the controversial $9.6 billion controversial judgment case Process and Industrial Development (P&ID) won against Nigeria a “scam.”
Speaking at the General Debate of the ongoing 74th Session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, the President maintained that his administration would not tolerate attempts by persons and organizations he called international criminals to defraud the country.
Buhari, however, noted that the world was facing various crises, including financial crimes, and called for collective efforts by all countries to address the problems.
The President’s words: “Organised criminal networks, often acting with impunity across international borders present new challenges where only collective actions can deliver genuine results.
“This is true in the battle against violent extremism, against trafficking in people and drugs and against corruption and money laundering.
“The present Nigerian government is facing the challenges of corruption head-on. We are giving notice to international criminal groups by the vigorous prosecution of the P&ID scam attempting to cheat Nigeria of billions of dollars.”
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Recent development: As the court hearing of the on-going legal battle between the Federal Government and P&ID approaches, Nigerian delegates have departed to the United Kingdom to quash the earlier judgment.
It was learnt that a team of high-powered government officials is in London ahead of September 26th court session in the case against P&ID.
The Delegates: According to reports, the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr. Abubakar Malami, the Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, and the Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, led the Government delegation to the U.K on Saturday.
Other member of the delegation include the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, and the acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Ibrahim Magu.
The Backstory: As earlier reported by Nairametrics in its articles, P&ID was awarded $6.6 billion in an arbitration decision over a failed project to build a gas processing plant in the Southern Nigerian city of Calabar. With the accumulated interest payments, the sum now tops $9 billion, which amounts to about 20% of Nigeria’s foreign reserves.
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