How Diezani got oil barons to cough up $115m for Jonathan’s re-election bid

he Economic and Financial Crimes Commission has discovered that some oil barons contributed the $115m (N23, 299,705,000bn) disbursed by former Minister of Petroleum, to bribe officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission prior to the last general election in 2015.

The funds were meant to induce the INEC officials into altering the results of the presidential election.

Owner of an oil company, Leno Olaitan Adesanya, reported to the Abuja office of the EFCC for questioning on Thursday, but he was redirected to the Lagos office o the anti-graft commission, The Nation reports.

wo others, who have been summoned by the EFCC, have reportedly gone with the wind.

The EFCC has also recovered N408.7 million from some of the beneficiaries of the funds. Fidelity Bank refunded N49.7 million, its profit for disbursing the funds while some former and serving INEC officials in Oyo and Ogun states also refunded N359 millon.

The report further states that the oil companies were compelled by Alison-Madueke to contribute $88.35million to the campaign of former President, Goodluck Jonathan.

A top EFCC source was quoted to have said: “While scrutinizing their records, we discovered that Fidelity Bank made a profit of N49.7million from the disbursement transactions made in all its branches nationwide. The management of the bank on Thursday refunded the profit while we are continuing investigation on other funds.”

“Some former and serving INEC officials in Oyo and Ogun have paid back N359million to EFCC. What happened was that while N802m was voted for bribery of INEC officials and NGOs in Oyo State to change presidential poll results, about N629m was dished out in Ogun State.”

“But some of these beneficiaries in Oyo and Ogun were suspicious of the sources of the funds. They cooperated and went to the designated Fidelity Bank branches and collected the cash. Instead of spending it, they sought the service of lawyers who advised them to open accounts to keep the cash in case there are issues in the future.”

“When this matter came up, the lawyers assisted in locating the funds and the N359million was refunded. We are working on other beneficiaries to recover the slush funds.”