Nigeria is in a bind. A court in the United Kingdom last week awarded a fine of $9.6 billion against her in a dispute brought by the Irish firm, Process and Industrial Developments Limited (P&ID), over the botched 2010 Gas Supply and Processing Agreement (GSPA).
The decision empowers the aggrieved contractor to seize assets of the Federal Government of Nigeria to the tune of the amount awarded anywhere on the planet.
By some estimates, that sum represents one-fifth of the country foreign reserves.
Some lawyers have argued that the existence of the State Immunity Act 1978 (the Act) of the United Kingdom, makes the prospect of immediate enforcement of the judgment remote. This is an opinion which would be tested in the courts soon.
For now, the brutal award hangs over this nation like a poorly-secured sword.
It has generated the predictable cocktail of outrage, buck-passing and protests. Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, defending himself against allegations lack of diligence in prosecuting the matter, has been regaling us with tales of all he did to avert it. He has even gone a step further by absolving himself of all blame.
Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, never slow to sniff out a conspiracy against the administration, emphasised that government’s concerns were primarily about “the underhanded manner in which the contract was negotiated and signed.”
He said: “Indications are that the whole process was carried out by some vested interests in the past administration, which apparently colluded with their local and international conspirators to inflict grave economic injury on Nigeria and its people.”
In a fit of righteous rage, some super patriots marched on the UK High Commission and Irish Embassy in Abuja, brandishing placards denouncing the hefty fine.
Abuja’s famine of thought never fails to produce the ludicrous. How these sponsored demonstrations would make the $9.6b award go away, boggles the mind. This judgment wasn’t an act of the UK parliament, neither was it a decree by the British sovereign. It was a judgment of the court over which the government has no veto power.
The protests were clearly acts of frustration that, in a way, underline our limited options.
Thankfully, on the same day that the noisemakers were at the embassies, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo was presiding over a conclave of lawyers to thrash out a way forward. The outcome appears to have been a decision to duke it out in the courts.
That is as it should be, given the messy details about the contract that have since emerged. For instance, it has come to light that the deal was signed whilst then President Umaru Yar’Adua was in a coma.
A lot of noise is made these days about cabals, but in the days when the late president was missing in action, a cabal truly ran the affairs of the country with the result being the sort of mess that has now been created.
Michael Aondoakaa, who was Attorney-General and Minister of Justice when the contract was signed said he first heard of it when news of the award broke, and it was never approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC). So on whose authority was the deal initialled, tying Nigeria to all sorts of legal obligations?
Central Bank Governor, Godwin Emefiele, has also said there was no evidence in the bank’s records showing that the contractor invested $40 million in the botched project.
No doubt there would be more awkward revelations in the days and weeks ahead. For those who have brought us to this point, there has to be a judgment day too. That informs the evolving blame game.
But no amount of buck-passing can remove the fact that every administration from Yar’Adua’s to Goodluck Jonathan’s and now Muhammadu Buhari’s regime, have by their acts of omission or commission contributed to the debacle.
For example, court documents from this case claim that the delay in constituting Buhari’s first cabinet in 2015 negatively impacted the resolution process. Perhaps we forgot that the world doesn’t work by our African time and that some courts operate outside our jurisdiction.
Government is a continuum. If your predecessor messed things up, it is your responsibility to set them right and carry on. At this point it is immaterial if the crooked deal was cooked up under Yar’Adua. He is long gone. Nigeria is the one left with a massive headache.
I wouldn’t waste time arguing the merits of the case for either party. That’s a job for the lawyers. As a Nigerian I don’t want to see my country fritter away $9.6b knowing the likely consequences for our limping economy.
I am more concerned with whether we can learn any lessons from this latest embarrassment. The P&ID case underlines the funny manner in which this country is governed. It is the latest one that highlights our culture of playing fast and loose with the rules – especially as they concern government contracts.
A contract – especially international ones – is binding and should be respected. Fix your system so it doesn’t throw up dodgy contracts. When government officials, deceived by the sense of their own power, arbitrarily repudiate agreements that have been legally endorsed, there’s always a price to pay. Unfortunately, the price is usually paid from the public treasury and not the individual officer’s purse.
In the 80s, then Lagos State Governor Lateef Jakande conceived of a metroline for the city. When the military junta headed by the then General Buhari seized power in 1983, it was cancelled at the resulting cost of $78 million to the taxpayer. Such horrendous waste!
There are several other cases with similar background that are ongoing and may one day blow up in our collective faces. While the government carries out it probes to punish those responsible, it should urgently investigate these ticking time bombs and defuse them while there’s still time.
The tired rituals of grand reaction after the disaster has occurred are no longer entertaining.
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