The jury in the high-profile bribery trial of Diezani Alison-Madueke, Nigeria’s former Petroleum Minister, began deliberations on Monday after nearly four months at London’s Southwark Crown Court.
Statements made by Kevin Okyere and Igho Sanomi to UK investigators were read out in Southwark Crown Court during the trial.
Alison-Madueke, Nigeria’s minister for petroleum resources from 2010 to 2015 under then-President Goodluck Jonathan, has pleaded not guilty to five counts of accepting bribes and one count of conspiracy to commit bribery.
Prosecutors allege Alison-Madueke, 65, led a “life of luxury” in London, being given high-end properties to stay in and taken on luxury shopping sprees by industry figures interested in lucrative oil and gas contracts.
But lawyers for the former minister, who was also briefly president of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, argued that Alison-Madueke was merely a “rubber stamp” for official recommendations.
“At no time did I ask, take, or seek a bribe or bribes of any sort,” Alison-Madueke told the jury when she gave evidence last month.
Alison-Madueke stood trial alongside oil industry executive Olatimbo Ayinde, 54, who is charged with one count of bribery relating to Alison-Madueke and a separate count of bribery of a foreign public official.
Alison-Madueke’s brother, 69-year-old Doye Agama, is charged with conspiracy to commit bribery relating to Agama’s church. They both deny the charges.
After a trial that began in late January, the jury was sent out just before 1130 GMT on Monday to consider their verdicts on the eight charges the three defendants face.
Kevin Okyere and Igho Sanomi, were part of a group of industry insiders who are alleged to have bankrolled spending sprees and luxury home stays by Alison-Madueke, 65. None of them has been charged in this case, and they have not appeared in person at court.
Alison-Madueke denies five counts of accepting bribes and a charge of conspiracy to commit bribery. She has said that the cost of services rendered for her while on official duties was later repaid.
In a written statement given to National Crime Agency (NCA) investigators in June 2016, Ghanaian businessman Okyere said he had paid for items bought at Peter Jones by Alison-Madueke two years earlier, after bumping into her at the tills and seeing that she did not have enough money.
Okyere, who is chief executive of several oil and gas companies, said that the £3,900 was later reimbursed by Alison-Madueke in cash at his office in the Nigerian capital, Abuja.
He also told investigators that the allegation that he had “bribed” Alison-Madueke was “completely untrue”.
Nigerian oil tycoon Sanomi, meanwhile, gave a statement to the NCA in June 2017.
In it, he said “foreign currency exchange [was] difficult in Nigeria” and that as a result he “obtained items on Mrs Alison-Madueke’s behalf in London”, which would all be reimbursed.
He also told the NCA that his companies “always won their contracts fairly bidding against other competitors and that at no point was Mrs Alison-Madueke or anyone else improperly involved in any allocation” to him or his companies.
A statement was also read to the court on Tuesday by former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, who appointed Alison-Madueke as oil minister in 2010.
In it, he said it was not unusual for third parties to make payments on behalf of ministers on overseas duties.
He added that “any properly incurred incidental or in-kind assistance from third parties would be recorded and reimbursed where applicable”.
Jonathan also said he had approved her use of private jets on some foreign trips.
The court previously heard how oil tycoons had allegedly paid for private jets as part of the “life of luxury” provided to the minister, which is also alleged to have included the use of properties worth millions of pounds and chauffeur-driven cars.
Alison-Madueke finished nearly 11 days of testifying earlier on Tuesday.
She was asked what efforts she had made since her arrest in 2015 to provide evidence that money spent in multiple shopping trips to Harrods and other luxury stores had been paid back.
She said that since her arrest, she had been held in London by the NCA “at the expense of taxpayers and had not been allowed to go back to Nigeria in the last 10 years”.
Alison-Madueke also said her papers had been seized by the Nigerian authorities, whom she accused of failing to assist her defence because of their political opposition to the government she had been part of.
She denied she was lying about not receiving financial or other advantages from oil executives.
“At no time did I do anything to influence or show favour to anyone,” she told the court.
During six days of cross-examination by prosecutor Alexandra Healy KC, the ex-minister was taken through a large number of expensive items, such as Gucci handbags and furniture, which the prosecution alleges were bought for her.
In a trip in November 2013 to Vincenzo Caffarella, a decorative arts and antiques shop in London, £170,000 was allegedly spent on a “vast amount of property” including Venetian lamps and vases.
Alison-Madueke denied it was to furnish a house she was having built in Nigeria, saying most of the items were not for her.
“I don’t think anyone would risk their career for furniture and handbags,” she told the court.
