Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, has disclosed that the Federal Government has formally requested the National Assembly to approve payment of 2.5% commission to those who assisted government in recovering stolen funds from foreign countries.
Malami, who gave this hint while defending his ministry’s 2020 budget proposals before the Senate Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights and Legal Matters for the defence of his ministry’s budget for 2020, said the amount to be paid paid to the Asset Recovery Unit in his office would be used to “service bills”.
He explained: “We are progressively making vital recoveries of our looted funds stashed abroad. However, let me affirm that the legal procedural requirements for these recoveries are all-together tasking and cumbersome,” he said.
“Most times, we have to engage the services of well-grounded lawyers and consultants to effect recovery. To smoothen our operations in this regard, it was deemed expedient to establish Asset Recovery Unit in my office and so far, the effort is quite sultry.
“I will like to reiterate my request to the effect that about 2.5 per cent of the recovered looted money to be earmarked to the Asset Recovery Unit to service logistics, operational cost, payment to private lawyers and consultants”, the minister added.
The lawmakers agreed with the minister’s explanation on the payment of 2.5% commission and advised him to send it to the National Assembly in the form of a bill to avoid being misinterpreted as “padding”, since the amount was not provided for in the 2020 Appropriation Bill.
For instance, in his remarks, Senator Chukwuka Utazi, while supporting the request advised that such appropriation would facilitate the recovery of more looted funds even as he commended the minister for his commitment to looted funds repatriation since 2015.
In addition, Malami also sought the National Assembly’s approval of an extra N30 billion for judgement debts service annually as Nigeria’s judgement debt has risen to N150 billion currently.
He explained that while N10 billion was paid in 2017, N150 billion remains unpaid; prompting beneficiaries to mount severe pressure on the ministry.
The nation’s chief legal officer said that the judgement debt derived from bad cases, contract failures, damages arising from fines on human rights abuses.
The minister clarified: “The Ministry of Justice was mandated to take inventory and explore avenues for the payment of judgement debt. This has arisen because it was only in 2017 that the sum of N10 billion was disbursed for the payment of judgment debt as an operative.
“As it stands, the sum of over N150 billion remains unpaid, prompting beneficiaries of this sum to keep mounting pressure on the ministry.
“I hereby request that you intervene on these long-standing issue by appropriating the sum of N30 billion annually to mitigate this challenge to forestall approved interest and unwarranted litigations arising from our failure to effect payment”, Malami added.
Meanwhile, the total budgetary proposal for the Ministry of Justice in the 2020 fiscal year is N33 billion
