CHIEF OLUSEGUN OBASANJO BEREAVED

IKEJA, Lagos, Nigeria – Former President of Nigeria, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has been bereaved. Counsel to John Abebe, Uche Nwokedi made the revelation at a Special Offences court in Ikeja, where he appeared for his client in a suit involving $4 million fraud filed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission(EFCC) against Dr John Abebe in Lagos.

He informed the court that the defendant’s mother died on Sunday night in an undisclosed hospital in the United Kingdom and urged the court to release his passport to him to allow him to travel and make necessary preparation as regards the death of his mother.

According to the agency, Abebe “knowingly forged” a November 30, 1995 letter written by BP Exploration Nigeria Limited to Inducon (Nigeria) Ltd and that Abebe illegally inserted into page 2 of the said letter the following words: “Also note that the ‘Buy-Out Option’ only applies to the pre-production stage of the NPIA. The $4m buy-out is thus irrelevant from production of oil in any of our fields.”

While being led in evidence by the prosecution counsel, Rotimi Oyedepo, the EFCC, witness, a professor of law, Fidelix Odita, explained to the court how the NPI agreement Abebe entered with BP Exploration Nigeria Limited was terminated before oil blocks was sold to Statoil. 

“I met Dr Abebe in February 2010 when I was instructed by Statoil to defend a claim brought by Dr Abebe and his company called Inducon. The proceedings were pending at the Federal High Court and on the instructions of Statoil, I prepared the defence, met the witnesses and took their proof. The claim was based on a Net Profit Interest in an oil block and the agreement was between BP Exploration Limited and Inducon, Statoil was not a party to the agreement. 

“In the course of reviewing Statoil documents, I found that Statoil had refused to enter into an NPI agreement with Abebe and it was on that we built our counterclaim. During the trial, many documents were tendered and in relation to one of them, we wrote to Abebe’s lawyer that we want to see the original copy of the document but the document was not produced. 

“We asked for the original copy of the document because we knew that the original was not available and that the document tendered was fabricated and the signature on it was imposed somehow, so we were not surprised when they were unable to produce the original copy. It was because of the rogue paragraph that was inserted in the purported agreement that we seek to see the original. The inserted paragraph does not make sense because the 1.5 per cent NPI was supposed to be payable after production. 

“Dr Abebe was paid some money by BP Exploration up till April 1999 but BP wants to leave Nigeria and they wanted to sell its interest in oil block to some buyers Including Statoil and it wanted to get rid of its obligations to Abebe under the NPIA. Even if there was an NPIA, Abebe has received $1m from BP as at the time of the terminated agreement. As at the time he brought the claim, he knew he had no claim and that it was a fraudulent claim he brought to court.”

Justice Dada, however, ordered the counsel to do the necessary application and further adjourned the matter till January 25, 2019, for possible adoption of written addresses