On Friday, a former minister of petroleum resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, slammed a N100 billion defamation lawsuit against the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in connection with a series of publications by the anti-graft agency alleging she stole billions while in office.

According to the court document, which was filed on May 26 and obtained by the Gazette, Mrs Alison-Madueke accused the EFCC of publishing multiple reports in a manner that portrayed her “as a common looter of national money and a debased and corrupt public officer.

In the suit marked CV/6273/2023 and filed before a High court at the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) through a team of lawyers led by Mike Ozekhome, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), the former minister is demanding the sum of N100 billion as damages against the EFCC and the AGF for the false, injurious, malicious and libellous publications”.

Mrs Alison-Madueke is the claimant and the EFCC is the sole respondent, while the Attorney General of the Federation is the second defendant in the suit.

“The publications are blatantly false and misleading,” she said in the suit noting that the EFCC and AGF defamed her by claiming she is corrupt.

Mrs Alison-Madueke served as Minister of Transportation (and then Mines and Steel Development) under late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua from 2007 to 2009 before becoming Petroleum Minister under President Goodluck Jonathan from 2010 to 2015.

However, in what appears to be a rebuttal to the EFCC’s ongoing investigations into Mrs Alison-Madueke, the Gazette in this report highlights five publications of corruption allegations that Mrs Alison-Madueke claims were false and intended to lower her reputation and integrity.

EFCC uncovers additional $2.5 billion, N47.2 million and $72.8 million in Fidelity Bank

In the case where the EFCC said it uncovered an additional $72,870,000 million connected to its investigation from Mrs Alison-Madueke, the latter in its suit described the publication as false information stating that the EFCC published the information without any scintilla of proof. 

She said for such “an incredulous volume of cash of N47.2 billion,” to have been stolen only the CBN could house such a humongous sum of cash. Yet they recklessly made such unfounded allegations.

Mrs Alison-Madueke, therefore, challenged that the EFCC should have made the videos to the public of the N47.2 billion recovered.

“The 1st Defendant should have made the videos of this N47.2 billion cash discovery public which would have made a good viewing to the general public and further calls upon those that discovered the alleged money to tell the public where exactly the money has been since kept.”

She also states that no money whatsoever to the sum of $72.8 million was ever discovered in Fidelity Bank that is associated with her, which she purportedly stole from the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC. 

EFCC traces N47.2 billion, $487.5 million to ex-minister Diezani Alison-Madueke

In the report which was published in August 2017 across several online and print newspapers, the EFCC alleged it traced at least N47.2 billion and $ 487.5 million in cash and properties to the former minister of petroleum resources.

Mrs Alison-Madueke in her suit only denied the revelation as false, saying it was also intended to tarnish her image, but did not give any specifics to prove how the EFCC lied in its statement.

“The 1st Defendant, (EFCC) is false, malicious, injurious and intended to lower the reputation and integrity of and did indeed lower the reputation and integrity of the Claimant in the estimation of right thinking members of the society within and outside Nigeria and also brought the Claimant into public ridicule, odium, contempt, derision and obloquy.”

A court order forfeiting $40 million linked to Diezani Alison-Madueke 

The former minister said the report which was published in January 2022 by EFCC on its website platform and other newspapers stating that she had forfeited jewellery valued at about $40 million to the Nigerian government was also false and untrue.

She accused the EFCC of misleading the court by providing false information in a court process dated and filed on the 4th day of July 2019.

In the case, Justice Nicholas Oweibo of the Lagos divisional Federal High Court granted the EFCC’s ex parte motion application, which was filed before the court by EFCC prosecutor Rotimi Oyedepo.

The EFCC stated in the application that the pricey items, which included wristwatches, necklaces, bracelets, bangles, earrings, and other items, were reasonably suspected to have been purchased with proceeds from the former minister’s illegal actions.

Magu’s statement that Diezani stole $2.5 billion belonging to the Nigerian government

The former minister stated in her suit that a claim by a former acting chairman of the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu, in February 2022 that she allegedly stole $2.5 billion from the Nigerian government was “libellous, false, malicious, injurious; and was intended to lower the reputation and integrity.”

Mr Magu also claimed that Mrs Alison-Maduekwe had a generation of looters supporting her actions which he said was not good for the image and development of the country.

He revealed that the EFCC was already in touch with the international community to facilitate the extradition of the former minister.

Attempt to extradite her through court

Mrs Alison-Madueke’s suit cited two court rulings, one of which ordered her arrest and the other was a judgement that rejected the EFCC’s request for an arrest warrant against the former minister.

She claimed that the order for her arrest which was issued on December 4, 2018, by Justice Valentine Ashi (now deceased) of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) was in response to “false information” provided by the EFCC to the court in an effort to intensify her extradition to Nigeria.

The case was eventually transferred to the Federal High Court in Abuja, where the EFCC filed 13 counts of money laundering against the former minister.

While the second order that declined the EFCC’s request to arrest her in October 2020, by Justice Ijeoma Ojukwu who ruled that the commission must file an affidavit with evidence to prove that the earlier court summons granted to the EFCC had failed in the extradition of Mrs Alison-Madueke before making another request.

The judge stated that the anti-corruption agency would be given time to clean the house in the ex-ministers prosecution.

She argued in her suit that the court’s second ruling providing the EFCC with another opportunity to make an extradition request was the result of the court relying on false information provided to the court by the EFCC in a court proceeding dated and filed on November 13, 2018.