We Will Withdraw $380m Abacha Loot If Re-Looted – Swiss Govt

Switzerland on Tuesday warned that the $380 million siphoned off by the family of Late Head of State, General Sani Abacha, which it agreed to return to Nigeria, will be withdrawn if the funds were re-looted.
In sounding the warning, the Swiss authorities said the confiscation order “allows for, among other things, that the funds restituted to the Federal Republic of Nigeria are monitored by the World Bank”, adding that if the monitoring is not effective, the funds will be withdrawn.
The Geneva public prosecutor’s office which said this further disclosed that with the return of the funds, the file on the affair which has been ongoing since 1999 will be closed.
The prosecutor’s office said the move comes on the heels of the agreement reached between the Federal Government and the Abacha family.
Daily Times recalls that the Federal Government has long been seeking for the return of the funds siphoned off by the Aba-cha family while he was in power from 1994-1998.
The Abacha family is believed to have diverted a total of about $5 billion from the Nigerian treasury with much of it ending abroad.
The $380 million in question was seized in Luxembourg in 2006 on the orders of the Geneva justice authorities. The funds were under the control of various companies controlled by the Abacha family, which is considered a criminal organisation, the Geneva prosecutor’s office said in a statement.
The repatriation and confiscation of the Geneva funds followed the conclusion of an agreement in July 2014 between Nigeria and the Abacha family. This set out the confiscation of the assets and their return to Nigeria, as well as the Federal Government dropping its complaint against one of Abacha’s sons, Abba.
According to the prosecutor’s office statement, the confiscation order “allows for, among other things, that the funds restituted to the Federal Republic of Nigeria are monitored by the World Bank”. If the monitoring is not effective, the funds will be returned to the Geneva authorities.
The statement also said that the file against Abba Abacha was now closed, based on an article in the penal code which allowed criminal proceedings to be abandoned once the defendant had made amends as much as was possible.
In 2012, after a legal back and forth, the Geneva Police Court gave Abba Abacha a one-year suspended prison sentence for belonging to a criminal organisation. Abba Abacha, however, was absent from the court room. The Federal Court in Lausanne, Switzerland’s highest instance, quashed the sentence in May 2014.
The Geneva public prosecutor’s statement reads in part: “The Public Ministry has confiscated some $380 million to the Abacha family and allocated them to the Federal Republic of Nigeria. They will be returned to this country under the control of the World Bank.
“The confiscation order provides inter alia that the funds returned to the Federal Republic of Nigeria will be a monitoring of the World Bank, on terms to be set up. As this monitoring will not be effective, the funds remain in the hands of the Geneva justice.
“On the basis of Article 53 of the Criminal Code, which allows to drop the charges if the defendant repairs as possible the dam-age, the prosecution then closed the case, ongoing since 1999 and finally against the single Abba Abacha. The latter, who served 561 days in custody between 2004 and 2006, has been denied any compensation as such, due to the proven existence of a criminal organisation”.