Africa-Press – Nigeria. <\/strong><\/span>A former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke has distanced herself from the ownership of $52.5m recently repatriated to Nigeria from the United States of America, USA.<\/p>\nThe former Minister who has been in the United Kingdom, UK, since she left the shores of Nigeria claimed that the money linked to her in the media as a loot actually belonged to a Nigeria\u2019s oil magnate, Kola Aluko.<\/p>\n
Breaking her silence in the matter through her counsel, Prof Mike Ozekhome SAN, Mrs Alison Madueke insisted that there was nothing like \u201cDiezani Loot\u201d, since she had no hand whatsoever in the issues surrounding the forfeiture of the money by the owner.<\/p>\n
Stating her position, the former minister said the $52.5m came from a vessel seized by the American government from Kola Aluko and which was later sold and proceeds returned to the federal government of Nigeria.<\/p>\n
Her denial of ownership of the money was contained in a lengthy press statement issued on Sunday by the Chambers of Mike Ozekhome SAN and titled \u201d There is no such thing as Diezani Loot \u201c.<\/p>\n
Part of the statement read \u201cMy chambers makes this intervention in the public domain as Solicitors to Diezani Alison-Madueke (DAM) ,the former Minister of Petroleum Resources, HMPR.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs her Solicitors, we are fully versed in and conversant with her present ordeal and the entire facts surrounding her matters both here in Nigeria and abroad. So, we write from the vantage position of one that is aware of the cocktail of lies that have been spurned around her cases in the last ten years.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany of the narratives are outrightly false; some others sheer outlandish speculations; and most, simply bizzare stories cooked up by her traducers to extract a Shylock\u2019s pound of flesh from her for reasons she does not know and cannot even fathom.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis intervention therefore seeks to correct this skewed narrative and set the records straight for purposes of history. Many Nigerians often talk about wanting \u2018technocrats\u2019 to be involved in governance. They desire that people with character and integrity should join politics.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe agree with them. However and regrettably too, now and again and many a time, the same people not only allow, but actually join the bandwagon to mob-lynch those who chose to serve the nation.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd we often do this insidiously, covertly and overtly, even when there is no concrete or even any iota of proof that such public officers ever abused their offices or stole from public coffers.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is therefore surprising and of great concern to us, to see the level of sustained vilification of an innocent Nigerian citizen who has not yet been tried and found guilty of any offence known to law by any court of law whether in Nigeria or abroad. The person at the receiving end is Citizen Diezani Alison-Madueke (DAM).<\/p>\n
\u201cWe note with concern the recent deliberate attempt to link her with what has been described as a civil forfeiture of a yacht Galactica, the sale of which was said to have yielded $52.8m to the US government; which sum has since been repatriated to Nigeria.<\/p>\n
\u2018This is a clear example of the mischievous and cruel sport of tarnishing the image of the lady through a bouquet of consistent, persistent and unrelenting cocktail of falsehoods and misinformation.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe purveyors of this line of misinformation term it \u201cname-and-shame\u201d. To sell the storyline, the architects ensured they attached Diezani\u2019s name to a recovered yacht which is not in any way linked to her.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey now falsely termed it \u201cDiezani loot\u201d. Nothing of the sort ever happened. She was never involved in the purchase, use and sale of the said yacht.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe yacht Galactica, from information readily available in the public domain and in open sources, was purchased by Mr Kola Aluko who had used the vessel until he agreed to its forfeiture to the United States of America.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe yacht Galactica was neither owned nor ever used by our client. DAM has in fact never set her eyes on the yacht. Kola Aluko is an experienced businessman who had been in business well before DAM came into office as HMPR.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only tenuous basis for deliberately linking DAM to the said yacht is the false narrative that the Strategic Alliance Agreements (SAAs) which were entered into between Kola Aluko & Jide Omokore\u2019s Atlantic Energy companies and NNPC, were allegedly corruptly awarded to the said companies by DAM. DAM was not the GMD of the NNPC as so did not and could not have awarded the said contracts.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe plead, as her lawyers, with all and sundry that she be accorded fair hearing and that the process of these UK court proceedings be allowed to take their natural course to avoid prejudice to her in the ongoing subjudice UK proceedings against her.<\/p>\n
\u201dThose purveyors and peddlers who habitually spin these outrightly false, unfounded, defamatory, unintelligent and indefensible narratives to denigrate and humiliate her should please find better use of their time and leave DAM alone.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet the law take its natural course without interference. We humbly pray\u201d, the statement said.<\/p>\n
Source: Daily Post Nigeria<\/b><\/p>\n
For More News And Analysis About Nigeria<\/span> Follow Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Kayode Lawal Africa-Press – Nigeria. A former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke has distanced herself from the ownership of $52.5m recently repatriated to Nigeria from the United States of America, USA. The former Minister who has been in the United Kingdom, UK, since she left the shores of Nigeria claimed that the money […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":146742,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,1437,29,28,2660],"tags":[6014,254],"class_list":["post-146743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-files","category-head-lines","category-homepage-english","category-to-homepage","tag-diezani","tag-nigeria"],"yoast_head":"\n
Ex-Minister of Petroleum, Diezani distances self from ownership of repatriated $52.8m loot - Nigeria<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke has distanced herself from the ownership of $52.5m rece ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Ex-Minister of Petroleum, Diezani distances self from ownership of repatriated $52.8m loot\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke has distanced herself from the ownership of $52.5m rece ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nigeria\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-01-19T13:19:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-01-29T21:46:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2025\/01\/sm_1737283868.08127.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Ex-Minister of Petroleum, Diezani distances self from ownership of repatriated $52.8m loot\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-01-19T13:19:02+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-01-29T21:46:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\"},\"wordCount\":882,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2025\/01\/sm_1737283868.08127.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Diezani\",\"Nigeria\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"files\",\"head lines\",\"homepage-english\",\"to-homepage\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/ex-minister-of-petroleum-diezani-distances-self-from-ownership-of-repatriated-52-8m-loot\",\"name\":\"Ex-Minister of Petroleum, Diezani distances self from ownership of repatriated $52.8m loot - 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