NEWS: Obasanjo, Atiku, Garuba, Abdusalami, Others Will Go Down In Halliburton Case… Or Will They Not? – Dr. Peregrino Brimah

* Obasanjo

As Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari orders the re-opening of the Halliburton Bribe scandal case, christened the “Biggest Scandal in Nigeria’s History,” the precedence-based question to ask is if he is capable and how far he will honestly be able to go in pursuing the many known culprits and metering justice.

Justice must be served, with all culprits prosecuted for the United States to repatriate about $140 million bribe money recovered from the culprits in the scandal.

Abubakar & Obasanjo 

#SwissLeaks, an expansive Indian Express Investigation in collaboration with Le Monde and International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, ICIJ report by Will Fitzgibbon with Musikilu Mojeed, this February detailed the monumental Halliburton scandal that yet remains un-addressed on the Nigerian side. The scandal from 1994 (Abdusalami)-2004 (Obasanjo) involved bribes by Kellogg, Brown and Root, KBR, Halliburton subsidiary to secure the $6 billion contract to build the Bonny Island Natural Liquefied Gas overambitious Project for the Nigerian government.

“A network of secretive banks and offshore tax havens was used to funnel US$182mn in bribes to Nigerian officials in exchange for US$6bn in engineering and construction work for an international consortium of companies that included a then Halliburton subsidiary.”

The Halliburton bribery scandal was so large that even the former US Vice president, Dick Cheney (Bush’s Dick), former company CEO, was indicted by Nigeria and cleared after Halliburton worked out a $35 million settlement. ($35 million that remains unaccounted for.)

London based HSBC bank was conduit for the bribes.