In 2016, Malami hired two lawyers for $17m to recover Abacha loot

Malami

In 2016, Abubakar Malami, former attorney-general of the federation (AGF), hired the services of two Nigerian lawyers — Oladipo Okpeseyi and Temitope Isaac Adebayo — for the repatriation of $321 million stolen by Sani Abacha, the former military head of state.

Malami engaged the two lawyers barely one year after he assumed office to act on his behalf in a suspicious move as the country incurred additional four percent of repatriated funds from commission and professional fees.

The repatriation of the stolen funds started before the administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015.

The money had been recovered and frozen in 2013 under former President Goodluck Jonathan but the repatriation process was stalled in 2015 following a lawsuit filed by the Abachas.

From 2013 to 2014, the federal government had engaged the services of Swiss lawyers, Enrico Monfrini and Christian Luscher, to recover the stolen funds from Liechtenstein and Luxembourg — and domiciled the monies with the attorney-general of Switzerland.

Nigeria had paid four percent of the recovered Luxemburg assets as professional fees and expenses to the foreign lawyers, in addition to roughly $6.8 million in fees paid to Monfrini for the Liechtenstein recoveries.

Since all the fees had been paid by Nigeria, it was expected that Malami, who was the then AGF, would sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Swiss authorities and commit to an undertaking that the funds would be properly utilised.

However, in December 2017, TheCable reported that Malami, in what appeared to be a suspicious move, engaged the services of the two Nigerian lawyers, which cost the country $16.9 million as commission and professional fees from the recovered funds.