The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has vowed to arrest former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Chief Dan Etete, former Attorney General of the Federation, Mohammed Adoke and Eni manager Roberto Casula “anywhere they are found.”

The trio have long been implicated in the Malabu oil deal of 2011.

Investigators say the deal was fraudulent.

EFCC officials on duty (Punch)

On Wednesday, April 17, 2019, Justice D.Z. Senchi of the Federal Capital Territory High Court, Jabi, Abuja granted the prayers of the EFCC and issued a warrant of arrest on the former ministers and the company boss.

What is this Malabu oil deal everyone has been talking about?

Oil Producing License (OPL) 245 contains about 9 billion barrels of crude oil. It is located in Nigeria’s oil rich Niger Delta region.

It is regarded as one of Africa’s richest oil blocs.

Etete was Petroleum Minister in the administration of military dictator, General Sani Abacha, who ruled Nigeria from 1993 to 1998.

Using the powers of his office, investigators say, Etete illicitly awarded OPL 245 to himself in 1998 through his company, Malabu Oil and Gas, at a time when the federal government was encouraging indigenous companies to acquire oil blocks at a reduced signature bonus of $20 million.

On July 2, 2001, democratically elected President Olusegun Obasanjo revoked Malabu’s ownership of OPL 245 and awarded the oil block to Shell without making the process public.

Malabu challenged the award of the block to Shell.

Dan Etete was Oil Minister during the Sani Abacha years (Sahara Reporters)

In 2006, following an out of court settlement, OPL 245 was returned to Malabu.

In 2011, Shell and Eni paid for the oil field.

Because they did not want to deal directly with Etete who had been convicted in France for his part in a separate money laundering scheme, Shell and Eni wired the money to an account belonging to the federal government of Nigeria domiciled with JP Morgan bank, London.

Investigators say Shell and Eni paid the Goodluck Jonathan administration $1.3billion for OPL 245.

According to the case file, the federal government of Nigeria under Jonathan, thereafter transferred $801million of the money into accounts controlled by Malabu and Etete in Nigeria.

Investigators say the money was then shared to various public officials and cronies in Nigeria as bribes; with the Nigerian government receiving only $210m USD as signature bonus on OPL 245.

This case has been heard in several countries

Reuters writes that; “the $1.3 billion deal has spawned legal cases spanning several countries and involving Nigerian government officials and senior Eni and Shell executives.

“An ongoing case in Milan alleges that roughly $1.1 billion of the total was siphoned to agents and middlemen”.

A court in Milan has already convicted middlemen Emeka Obi and Italian Gianluca Di Nardo for their roles in the deal.

President Goodluck Jonathan governed Nigeria during the Malabu oil payment (Al Jazeera)

Shell and Eni have for long maintained that they did no wrong.

On the arrest warrant issued on its manager by the Abuja court, Eni called the move “disproportionate and detrimental” to the rights of its manager.

“These warrants seem to have originated from the failure by the Nigerian Judicial Authorities to notify and serve the pending proceedings to the Eni managers as per international procedure for the last two years,” the Italian company added in a statement.

The EFCC said in a statement that the defendants have repeatedly failed to appear before the courts.

According to the EFCC, the Nigerian police, INTERPOL and other law enforcement agencies around the world now have the authority to arrest the men anywhere they are found on the planet.