Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), is scheduled to address a World Press Conference at his Abuja residence today.
The reason for the planned briefing has not been disclosed.
The development comes hours after TheCable published a report linking Atiku and his former wife, Jennifer Douglas, to a $500,000 payment allegedly made by Sunrise Power in 2003 in connection with the Mambilla hydropower project.
According to the report, Leno Adesanya, promoter of Sunrise Power and Transmission Company Limited, told an international arbitration tribunal that the $500,000 he transferred to Douglas in January 2003 was part of a foreign-exchange transaction undertaken for Atiku.
The payment was reportedly made on January 30, 2003, through China Castle Investments Limited, an offshore company controlled by Adesanya. The transaction occurred less than four months before Sunrise was purportedly awarded a build-operate-transfer contract for the Mambilla hydropower project.
Douglas had previously featured prominently in a corruption and money-laundering investigation involving Atiku and William Jefferson, a former US congressman who was convicted on corruption-related charges. Atiku has consistently denied wrongdoing in connection with the case.
Meanwhile, Nigeria on Thursday won an arbitration dispute against Sunrise Power over the Mambilla project after the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) tribunal in Paris ruled in favour of the Nigerian government.
The tribunal rejected Sunrise Power’s $2.35 billion claim and also ordered the company and its promoter to reimburse Nigeria $11.8 million in legal costs.
Sunrise Power had claimed that the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo awarded it a $6 billion contract in May 2003 to build, operate and transfer the Mambilla hydropower plant.
However, Obasanjo and former President Muhammadu Buhari had maintained that no such contract was ever signed. The ICC ruling reportedly affirmed Nigeria’s position, effectively removing the immediate risk of the country paying the $2.35 billion compensation claimed by Sunrise Power.
Atiku’s scheduled press conference is expected to provide an opportunity for him to respond to the latest report and other issues surrounding the Mambilla hydropower dispute.
