As the wave of controversy over Panama Papers moves across the world, sweeping persons and institutions off their feet, it appears not to have shaken anyone or anything in Nigeria. This is despite that several prominent Nigerians are alleged to be among the Africans named in the data detailing secret offshore assets released by a German newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung.
Nigerians linked to the secret firms from the data so far include the President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, and his wife, Toyin; a former Governor of Delta State, Mr. James Ibori; a former Minister of Defence, Lt.-Gen. Theophilus Danjuma (retd.); former President of the Senate, Sen. David Mark; Africa’s richest man, Mr. Aliko Dangote, and his cousin, Sayu Dantata; as well as the General Overseer of The Synagogue Church of All Nations, Prophet Temitope Joshua, and his wife, Evelyn.
The German newspaper, on April 4, 2016, released the Panama Papers, the biggest leak in the history of data journalism, publishing online 11.5 million documents from Panamanian law firm, Mossack Fonseca. The data showed how world leaders, celebrities, athletes, FIFA officials and criminals hide money, using anonymous shell corporations across the world.
The Panamanian law firm, regarded as one of the world’s most secretive companies, according to the documents, has helped clients launder money, dodge sanctions and evade tax.
The data was obtained by Süddeutsche Zeitung (http://www.sueddeutsche.de) and shared by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists with over 100 other media partners in 82 countries, including Nigeria’s Premium Times.
The Senate President, in a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Yusuph Olaniyonu, however stated that he had, in his different asset declarations, included properties owned individually by himself and his wife, while the properties in question formed part of his wife’s family asset.
However, the claim game took a new twist when fresh documents published by Premium Times revealed that Saraki’s wife is allegedly a business front for her husband contrary to claims by the Senate President that the assets belonged to his wife’s family. The new documents the news medium got from Mossack Fonseca allegedly showed that assets in Toyin’s name in tax havens were held in trust for her husband.
Ibori was linked to four offshore companies, including Stanhope Investments, which he allegedly used to open a Swiss bank account. He was governor between 1999 and 2007. Ibori, who was convicted in 2012 for fraud totalling nearly £50m by a London court and is currently serving a 13-year prison sentence in the UK, allegedly used the Swiss account to channel funds for the purchase of a $20m private jet.
At least eight offshore companies in the British Virgin Islands have also been linked to the immediate past Senate President, David Mark, in a secret assets scam.
Mark had, however, denied any link to the firms and threatened legal actions against media organisations that published stories that linked him to the scam.
For Danjuma, who was alleged to be a long-time user of offshore entities, the Mossack Fonseca files have also linked him to some companies, some of which were registered when he was still in active service.
The database, Opencorporates, indicate that Danjuma served as director and vice-president of Cross Group Holdings International, which was registered in Panama on October 15, 1976, a time he was the Chief of Army Staff.
Also on the list is the General Overseer of The Synagogue Church of All Nations, Prophet Temitope Joshua; and his wife, Evelyn, who have been linked to an offshore company, Chillon Consultancy Limited, which was incorporated on June 20, 2006, on the British Virgin Islands.
However, Joshua’s spokesperson, Mr. Iwelunmor Patrick, denied the report, describing it as an attempt to smear the good name of the cleric. He said the only two institutions linked to Joshua were SCOAN and Emmanuel TV.
Dangote and Dantata, the founder of MRS Holdings, were also named among Nigerians who operate shell accounts in tax havens.
The spokesman for the Dangote Group, Tony Chiejina, had said Dangote never had any relationship with the offshore entities.
As more persons are being named in the scandal, several Nigerians, civil rights groups, labour unions and activist have called for investigations of those involved, particularly in the illegal transfer of funds, and prosecution of those found to be liable.
For instance, a human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), stated that while private citizens named in the leak could be exempted, public officers among them were liable for prosecution.
Falana said, “Private persons are not prohibited from keeping accounts wherever they like. However, public officers have always been barred by the Code of Conduct Bureau and Code of Conduct Tribunal Act from operating foreign accounts in any manner whatsoever. To that extent, former and serving public officers whose accounts have been published in the Panama Papers are liable to be prosecuted, if they had failed to declare them in their asset declaration forms.
“Secondly, the onus is on them to prove that any funds in such accounts emanated from their legitimate income.”
Except they are innocent, the likes of Saraki, Mark and Danjuma fall into this category.
The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project had last Sunday given the CCB a 14-day ultimatum to commence the probe of Nigeria’s past and serving public officials indicted in the Panama Papers scam.
The group, which decried the extent to which Nigerian public officials had gone in breaching the code of conduct by going to conceal stolen wealth in offshore jurisdictions, said it would sue the CCB, if a probe of those indicted in the leak did not start in 14 days.
A security expert, Mr. Max Gbanite, specifically said the United Kingdom law could take its course against Saraki, if it was proven that he had hidden properties and bank accounts in London.
He said, “If he (Saraki) was found to have hidden properties in the UK, the UK law should take its course, if the Federal Government gets a good lawyer.”
The Nigeria Labour Congress had also called on the Federal Government to commence immediate investigation into those mentioned in connection with the Panama tax evasion scandal in a communiqué issued by the National Working Committee of the congress and signed by the President and General Secretary of the NLC, Mr. Ayuba Wabba and Dr. Peter Ezo-Eson, respectively.
The Presidency had said President Muhammadu Buhari would not dabble into the issues of those who were named in secret offshore assets, which, it said, might later become major legal matters.
Perhaps due to public pressure, it was learnt last weekend that the Federal Government had opened a file on all Nigerians whose names were mentioned as operating offshore accounts in notorious tax havens. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission was said to have been gathering reports from local and international media as well as the responses being given by those named. It was also learnt that the EFCC would then carry out its independent investigation and involve INTERPOL if necessary.
“We want all the names to be released first before launching full investigations. The issue is a tricky one. After preliminary investigations, we will seek advice from the Office of the Attorney General because investigations of such nature will need foreign collaboration,” a top government source said.
Observers of the Panama Papers scandal have described it as “a big issue” on the international scene, which has generated large-scale reactions from peoples and serious actions from governments concerned.
While the Nigerians linked to secret offshore accounts and companies have kept denying having links with the firms, the Prime Minister of Iceland, Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson, who was similarly named in the documents, had resigned less than 48 hours after they were leaked. He was regarded as the first major political casualty after the leak of the so-called Panama Papers financial documents.
Gunnlaugsson, 41, had been under pressure to resign after the leaked documents revealed that he and his wife, Anna Sigurlaug Palsdottir, owned an offshore company in the British Virgin Islands and had placed millions of dollars there.
The British Prime Minister, Mr. David Cameron, is currently under fire for having a link to a Panama offshore company. For the same scandal, Spain’s Industry Minister, Jose Manuel Soria, on Friday resigned over allegations that he had links with offshore companies.
Apparently, this is why many Nigerians, especially on social media, have called on Saraki to follow Soria and Gunnlaugsson’s step by resigning.
According to them, it is honourable for someone who holds a sensitive public office to step aside to clear his reputation if it is enmeshed in a scandal – and in Saraki’s case, scandals.
However, Saraki last Friday vowed not to succumb to calls for his resignation amid his corruption trial at the CCT and the revelations in Panama Papers. The Senate President rather blamed politicians for the increasing calls for his resignation over the recent scandals.
Saraki had also alleged that there were plans by some politicians to sponsor some civil society groups and youths to hold mass protests against him, an allegation that drew the ire of many on social media.
Another major response to the Panama Papers scandal internationally was when the Swiss police last Wednesday searched UEFA headquarters as part of a “criminal mismanagement” probe into a Champions League television rights deal signed by FIFA’s new president, Gianni Infantino.
The existence of the deal, signed when Infantino was UEFA’s legal chief, was revealed in the leaks. But the Swiss Office of the Attorney General implied that it had suspicions before the leaks came out.
Like the case of the Halliburton and Siemens scandals, there are fears that the case of Panama Papers might end up in the trash bin eventually. Nigerians had been indicted in the previous international scandals. While their foreign accomplices had been prosecuted in their respective countries, the Nigerian suspects, some of whom were indicted, have not been punished till today.
A former Vice Chancellor of the Olabisi Onabanjo University, Prof. Sheriffdeen Tella, lamented that corruption cases did not drive Nigerians to public action like they did in saner climes.The professor of economics noted that capital flight caused by corrupt public officials had denied the country huge socio-economic benefits.
He said, “It is not new in Nigeria; people have been taking our money and investing it elsewhere because the money was stolen so-to-say. The case of Panama is just the same thing; it was a way to diversify their portfolio of investment. Other countries are asking their leaders to resign or be forced out of office but we are used to that kind of thing (scandal) in Nigeria. This is unfortunate.
“The impact of such investments has remained the same, whether there is a leakage or not. Our people are always taking money to invest outside the country. The implication is that we will not benefit from the money in our economy. If they had invested the money in our economy, the economy would have been expanded and more people would have been employed. Taking the money away is like expanding other economies. We are used to such situation and it is unfortunate.”
However, the Lead Director of the Centre for Social Justice, Mr. Eze Onyekpere, said Nigeria should not be compared with Western countries where Panama Papers had generated national debates. According to him, Nigeria does not share the same culture with them.
He said, “These are public officers and the reports are there; it is for the anti-corruption agencies to do their investigation. Once they do their investigation, they will find out who is guilty or not. It is not a concluded case; there should be investigation.
“It has implications when you are keeping money outside (in foreign countries) because it leads to capital flight and what is supposed to be available to develop the economy is not there.”
When asked why the reactions from Nigeria are different from those in Iceland and the UK, Oyekpere said, “These are two different countries with different cultures. You cannot expect the reaction in the UK to be the same with Nigeria. It is understandable. The culture is the way people think; the way they behave and the way they relate with each other. Our culture is different from theirs. They have a lot of experience in democracy, transparency and accountability; that is not the same with us. They have a different political and democratic culture; we are still struggling to meet international standards.”
In his submission, a former Chairman of the Nigeria Bar Association, Ikeja Branch, Mr. Monday Ubani, stated that Panama Papers would not be treated like the Halliburton and Siemens scandals by the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration. The human rights lawyer said it would be difficult for an administration that came into power on the promise to fight corruption to treat the case with levity.
He said, “If I say there is a likelihood of this scandal to go the way of Siemens and Halliburton, then, it means I have lost confidence in this government. This is a government that came on the promise that they would fight corruption. I have the belief that President Buhari will not let this go and that he will fight corruption to a logical conclusion.
“I understand that the EFCC has stepped into the scandal and is already gathering information so that it can investigate those involved, why they were involved and why they hid these companies abroad and why they did it in such a manner as public officers; as public officers, were they supposed to own such companies abroad? I am holding this government by the jugular, based on its promises.”
(PUNCH)
