Home BUSINESS Malabu Scandal: Court orders return of OPL 245 to Shell, ENI

Malabu Scandal: Court orders return of OPL 245 to Shell, ENI

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A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, has reversed its previous ruling which retrieved the control of one of Nigeria’s richest oil blocks, OPL 245, from Shell and ENI.

The court had on January 26, issued an order, based on a motion by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, retrieving the ownership of the oil block from the multinational companies.

But on Friday, the court reversed the order, and it also refused the application of Malabu Oil and Gas to join the matter.

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In 1998, Dan Etete, who was then the minister of petroleum, had awarded the lucrative licence to Malabu, where he had stakes.

The sale to Malabu was nullified by Obasanjo in 1999 and assigned to Shell — without a public bid.

Ownership was suspiciously reverted to Malabu thereafter, leading to legal action by Shell who later resorted to negotiating directly with Etete after President Goodluck Jonathan assumed office in 2010.

A year later, the $1.3 billion deal was struck, with Malabu getting $1.1 billion from Shell and Eni to its transfer ownership, while the signature bonus was paid to Nigeria.

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In the deal finally consummated in 2011, only $210 million of the $1.3 billion paid by Shell and Eni for the block went into federal government coffers as “signature bonus”.

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