By Oscar Okhifo
Former Vice President and African Democratic Congress (ADC) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, has challenged the All Progressives Congress (APC) to produce evidence from the Mambilla arbitration showing that he was indicted for corruption, accusing the party of presenting allegations considered by the tribunal as though they amounted to a verdict against him.
Atiku, in a statement issued on Friday in Abuja by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, accused the APC Presidential Campaign Council of stripping the arbitral award of its legal context and creating what he described as a false impression that the tribunal found him culpable in the controversial Mambilla power project.
He specifically challenged the APC to identify the portion of the tribunal’s final award where it found that he received a $500,000 bribe, directed former Power Minister Olu Agunloye to award the Mambilla contract to Sunrise Power, abused his office or participated in a corrupt conspiracy.
According to Atiku, no such finding exists in the award, stressing that allegations examined during an arbitration should not be presented as established facts against a person who was not a party to the proceedings.
The APC Presidential Campaign Council had on Friday accused Atiku of compromising Nigeria’s interests over the Mambilla Hydroelectric Power Project and called on him to withdraw from the 2027 presidential race.
The council, in a statement by its spokesman, Dele Alake, focused particularly on a $500,000 payment made by businessman Leno Adesanya to Jennifer Douglas, Atiku’s then wife, in January 2003, during negotiations surrounding the project.
The payment was made through China Castle Investments Limited, an offshore company controlled by Adesanya. Adesanya told the tribunal that the money was connected to a foreign-exchange transaction carried out for Atiku, while the tribunal examined the circumstances and evidence surrounding the payment.
Atiku, however, argued that his position as Vice President under the Olusegun Obasanjo administration did not make him automatically responsible for every policy or decision taken by the government.
He cited his opposition to the controversial third-term bid under the Obasanjo administration as an example, saying his position at the time demonstrated that occupying an office did not mean endorsing or participating in every government decision.
“The same principle applies to Mambilla. I was not a member of the technical process that evaluated the competing proposals and recommended Sunrise. I did not sit on the procurement panel. I did not award the contract,” Atiku said.
He challenged his accusers to produce evidence of any instruction or intervention by him in the procurement process and, specifically, the paragraph in the tribunal’s award where such influence was found to be corrupt.
Atiku also addressed the $500,000 transaction involving Adesanya, saying the tribunal examined the payment made through China Castle Investments to Douglas.
He acknowledged that the tribunal rejected Adesanya’s explanation that the money arose from a foreign-exchange transaction because of a lack of supporting documentary evidence.
Atiku, however, maintained that the rejection of Adesanya’s explanation did not amount to a finding that he personally received a bribe or corruptly influenced the award of the Mambilla contract.
“Rejecting Adesanya’s explanation is fundamentally different from finding that Atiku received a bribe or corruptly used his office to secure the Sunrise contract,” he said.
He accused the APC of attempting to bridge what he described as a gap between the evidence considered by the tribunal and the political conclusion it now wants Nigerians to accept.
“If the tribunal wanted to find that the $500,000 was a bribe paid to Atiku, it could have said so plainly.
“If it wanted to find that Atiku abused his office to procure the contract for Sunrise, it could have said so plainly.
“The APC cannot insert into an international arbitral award words and conclusions that the arbitrators themselves did not put there,” he said.
The former Vice President also rejected claims that he deliberately refused to appear before the tribunal after being summoned.
He said he was not a party to the arbitration and did not testify before the tribunal, adding that the reported contents of the award did not establish that he had been summoned by the tribunal or ordered to give evidence.
“For the avoidance of doubt, I was not a party to the arbitration and I did not testify before the tribunal,” he said.
He noted that former Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Muhammadu Buhari testified on behalf of Nigeria during the proceedings, while former ministers Babatunde Fashola and Suleiman Adamu also participated in Nigeria’s defence.
Atiku said, however, that the appearance of those individuals could not be interpreted as proof that he himself had been summoned by the tribunal and refused to appear.
He further stressed that the arbitration was between Sunrise Power and Transmission Company Limited, Leno Adesanya and the Federal Republic of Nigeria, rather than proceedings in which he was personally a party.
He noted that the tribunal dismissed Sunrise’s claims and ordered Sunrise and Adesanya to reimburse Nigeria for 75 per cent of its legal fees and expenses, amounting to about $11.82 million.
Atiku said no damages, costs or other liability were imposed on him personally.
He then referenced a 1993 United States civil-forfeiture case involving President Bola Tinubu, arguing that the distinction between an allegation and a formal judicial finding should apply equally to political opponents.
Atiku acknowledged that the US proceeding was a civil forfeiture case involving property and not a criminal conviction of Tinubu personally for drug trafficking.
He nevertheless argued that the case resulted in a formal judicial order concerning funds held in an account in Tinubu’s name, contrasting it with what he described as the absence of a comparable finding against him in the Mambilla arbitration.
“The same standard must apply to everyone. Do not convert allegation into conviction. Do not transfer findings from one person to another. Do not manufacture a verdict where none has been produced,” he said.
Atiku challenged the APC to publish the exact paragraphs of the Mambilla award on which its allegations against him were based.
He specifically demanded that the party identify any portion where the tribunal found that he solicited or received a bribe, instructed Agunloye to award the contract to Sunrise or was culpable of corruption in connection with the project.
“These are not questions of political opinion. They are questions of record. They have factual answers,” he said.
The ADC presidential candidate said the controversy should not distract from issues he described as central to the 2027 presidential election, including the cost of living, employment, security and the effects of the Tinubu administration’s economic policies.
“Nigerians can read. Nigerians can distinguish allegation from adjudication. And Nigerians should not be asked to surrender their judgment to campaign propaganda,” Atiku said.
He concluded by insisting that the APC should stop presenting allegations surrounding the Mambilla arbitration as though they constituted a corruption verdict against him.
“An allegation is not a finding. Suspicion is not proof. The rejection of one man’s explanation is not the conviction of another man.
“And no amount of political repetition can write into an arbitral award a verdict that the tribunal itself did not deliver,” he said.