By Ezra Ijioma, Abuja
Tuesday, 30 Nov 2010
Managing Directors of two major multi-national companies, Halliburton and Shell Petroleum, have been summoned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission over the alleged involvement of their firms in the distribution of $180m and $240m bribe funds respectively.
Sources at the EFCC disclosed that formal letters of invitation for the two CEOs to appear at the commission’s head office in Abuja on Tuesday (today), were sent to the Nigerian head offices of the two companies in Lagos on Monday.
Operatives of the anti-graft agency had last week raided the two companies where about 21 of their expatriate staff and Nigerian top officials were arrested.
The arrested officials were granted administrative bail over the weekend but their travel documents were seized.
Apart from the invited CEOs of Shell and Halliburton billed to appear on Tuesday (today), the MDs of Technip and Saipem, both of who are linked to the Halliburton bribe scams, are also to report in the Abuja office of the EFCC on Tuesday (today) in addition to four other expatriate officials of Panalpina and two from Halliburton.
Also, eight Nigerian officials of Halliburton as well as seven of their counterparts in Panalpina will also face EFCC interrogators at the Commission’s office in Lagos on Tuesday.
While the Halliburton, Technip and Saipem officials are being probed over a $180m bribe scam, Shell and Panalpina officials are being grilled over alleged complicity of their companies in the sharing of $240m bribe to some officials, especially Customs officials in Nigeria, Angola, Libya and other countries between 2001 and 2006.
When contacted on the invitations to the companies‘officials, the EFCC Head of Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Babafemi, said the invitation was part of on-going investigations of various bribery scams.
Babafemi had told THE PUNCH two weeks ago that the commission would investigate the bribery cases as its Chairman, Mrs Farida Waziri, had referred them to the appropriate department.
Source: Punch
