The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Oluyinka Akintunde

  • World Bank officials to meet Osinbajo, Adeosun over projects in Nigeria

    A World Bank Mission, comprising of 10 Executive Directors, is expected in Nigeria today to hold high-level discussions with the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo; Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun and some Governors over the Bank’s projects in the country.

    In the World Bank Mission are the Bank’s Executive Directors for Switzerland, France, Italy, Nordic, Peru, Germany, South Africa (representing Angola, Nigeria and South Africa), Burkina Faso (representing Francophone Sub-Saharan Africa), Zimbabwe (representing Anglophone Sub-Saharan Africa), United Kingdom and Indonesia.

    A statement from the ministry of finance signed by Oluyinka Akintunde, Special Adviser on Media and Communications to Minister of Finance said “the delegation will discuss ongoing World Bank projects and the country’s development priorities with the Vice President, Minister of Finance and the Governors.”

    The officials will also meet the organised private sector in Lagos as well as undertake a tour of LAPO Microfinance project in Lagos and Azura Power Plant in Edo State.

    The visit Akintunde noted “is expected to provide a first-hand impression of the challenges that both the Federal and State Governments face in implementing development projects as well as ensuring good governance overall.”

    “It will further enhance the goal of the Bank for member-countries and the effectiveness of the Executive Directors in providing the necessary support” he said.

  • FG restates commitment to global fight against terrorism

    The federal government has affirmed its commitment to the global fight against the financing of terrorism.

    A press release issued and signed by Oluyinka Akintunde, Special Adviser, Media and Communications to the Minister of Finance said finance Minister, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, gave this pledge at an International Conference against the financing of terrorism in Paris, France.

    The Conference, which had as theme “No money for terror”, Akintunde said, was hosted by the French President, Emmanuel Macron and was attended by the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde; President of the World Bank Group, Jim Kim; US Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin as well as UK Chancellor, Phillip Hammond.

    Adeosun, who represented President Muhammadu Buhari at the Conference, said the country was reinvigorating efforts to tackle the financing of terrorism.

    In her address to the conference, the Minister said, “the Nigerian Government is very committed to the fight against terrorism and cutting off funding for terrorists’ activities.

    “The Government, in addition to monitoring of the formal channels of finance via the Nigeria Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) and other bodies, is also monitoring ‘non-formal cash-based structures’, which can often be used for illicit purposes.”

    Adeosun emphasized the need to address the root cause of terrorism and not the symptoms.

    She disclosed that the men and officers of the Nigeria Customs Service were working to effectively track physical cash movements and transactions at the various borders, including Niger, Benin Republic and Cameroon.

  • ‘Switzerland returned $322.5m Abacha loot with interest’

    Switzerland said it has returned all the money kept in the country by late Nigeria’s Head of State Gen. Sani Abacha, with 1.5 million dollars interest.

    Amb. Pio Wennubst, Assistant Director-General and Head, Global Cooperation Department, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, told our Correspondent in New York.

    Wennubst said Switzerland returned about 322.5 million dollars ( N116.11 billion ) to the Federal Government.

    According to him, the original amount was 321 million dollars.

    The Federal Government had announced receipt of 322.51 million from the Swiss government as part of the looted funds recovered from the late former Head of State.

    The Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, through her Special Adviser, Media and Communications, Oluyinka Akintunde, had confirmed the receipt of money from Switzerland.

    Akintunde said: “We state that $322,515,931.83 (N116,105,735,458.80) was received into a Special Account in the Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN ) on Dec. 18, 2017, from the Swiss government’’.

    Confirming this, Wennubst said: “We returned 321 million dollars including the interests.

    “We return all the amount, 322.5 million dollars including the interest for the time that the funds were blocked’’.

    The Swiss envoy also said that the money was returned to the Nigerian Government unconditionally.

    “We are not talking about the condition; there was a programme on the social safety net that was developed by the Government of Nigeria and the Bank.

    “After discussing, the only condition, set by the judiciary, not by us, was that the return of this asset should have been monitored by the World Bank and this is where we worked on’’.

    According to him, these funds were part of the Nigerian Government contributions to the social safety net programme, “plus concessional loans from the Bank”.

    We recall that the ‘Abacha loot’ was frozen in 2014 by a Swiss court after a legal procedure against his son, Abba Abacha.

    Originally deposited in Luxembourg, the money was a fraction of the billions of dollars allegedly looted during his rule from 1993 to 1998.

    Similarly, the UK Government also pledged its commitment to ensuring that money and other assets illegally transferred from Nigeria are repatriated back to the country.

    Mr Nick Dyer, Director General, Economic Development and International, UK Department for International Development told our correspondent that assets return would contribute to the development of the origin countries.

    Dyer said it was an important part of the development process to identify how and where assets were going astray and to also recover them and send them back.

    NAN

  • Abacha loot: FG confirms recovery of $322.51m from Switzerland

    The Federal Government says it has received 322.51 million dollars from the Swiss Government as part of looted funds recovered from former Head of State, late General Sani Abacha.

    Mr Oluyinka Akintunde, the Special Adviser, Media and Communications to the Minister of Finance, said this in a statement on Tuesday in Abuja.

    According to Akintunde, the government received the money since Dec., 2017.

    Akintunde said there was no controversy surrounding the recovery of stolen funds by the former head of state from the Swiss Government.

    “The minister wishes to dissociate herself and the Federal Ministry of Finance from recent reports on the Abacha refunds.

    “The minister had at no time written any letter to the President or any member of the Federal Executive Council ( FEC ) on the payment of lawyers for the Abacha recovery.

    “She also refutes the flawed reports of controversy surrounding the Abacha recovery.

    “We wish to state that the sum of 322,515,931.83 dollars was received into a Special Account in the Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN ) on Dec. 18, 2017 from the Swiss Government.

    “For the avoidance of doubt, there is no controversy concerning the recovery of the Abacha monies from the Swiss Government,” he said.

    Akintunde said the Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, frowned at a recent report that she objected to the payment of 16.9 million dollars to two lawyers who recovered the Abacha funds.

    In 1999, the Nigerian Government hired Mr Enrico Monfrini, a Swiss lawyer to recover the Abacha loot.

    After a successful negotiation by Monfrini, the recovered money was domiciled with the Attorney-General of Switzerland pending the signing of an MoU with Nigeria to avoid the issues of accountability that trailed previous recoveries.

    All that was left after the signing of the MoU was a government-to-government communication for the money to be repatriated to Nigeria.

    However, Abubakar Malami, the Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of the Federation, later engaged the services of another set of lawyers in 2016 for a fee of about N6 billion (16.9 million dollars).

    The two Nigerian lawyers are Mr Oladipo Okpeseyi, a senior advocate of Nigeria ( SAN ), and Temitope Adebayo.

    NAN