Since assuming office on May 31, the current government has made recovering looted funds it main priority, with anti-graft agencies tracking monies stashed abroad. Last week, the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) Ibrahim Magu and the justice minister Abubakar Malami, led a team of detectives to the UAE to discuss recovering Nigerian funds stashed there.
While in Dubai, they got the authorities there to agree to prevent the movement of the funds out of the country. During President Muhammadu Buhari's visit to the UAE in January, the two countries signed several pacts called a Judicial Agreement on Extradition, Transfer of Sentenced Persons, Mutual Legal Assistance on Criminal Matters and Mutual Legal Assistance on Criminal and Commercial Matters, which allows for the recovery and repatriation of stolen wealth.
Earlier this week, the federal government's team, started comparing collated intelligence notes with their UAE counterparts. Apparently, seven former governors, six former ministers and a fleeing presidential aide implicated in the $2.1bn arms deals, ex-military chiefs under probe and about five Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leaders have either stashed away funds in Dubai or acquired properties there.
One EFCC source said: “The federal government team has met with those from the UAE on intelligence sharing, the list of those on the EFCC's radar, the number of highly-placed Nigerians with fat accounts in UAE and those with choice properties in Marina, Bur Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Doha. Some of the former governors include one from the south-south, two from north central, two from the north east, one from the north west and one from the south west.
“More than six ex-ministers and a former presidential aide, who is on the run over the $2.1billion arms deals, were said to have acquired choice mansions and malls in UAE. One of the former ministers, who was alleged to own two houses in Dubai, was said to have served as a front for a former first lady."
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