$2 billion arms deal
[2] The illegal deal was revealed following an interim report of the presidential investigations committee on arms procurement under the Goodluck Jonathan administration.
The investigative report indicated that a total sum of $2.2 billion was inexplicably disbursed into the office of the National Security Adviser in procurement of arms to fight against insurgency but was not spent for that purpose.
[5] Colonel Dasuki was arrested on 1 December 2015 by the Department of State Security Services and transferred to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for further interrogation.
[7] After 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped in Chibok by the Boko Haram in April 2014, the following month, Marion Ford, an American living in Prague, the Czech Republic, was approached about procuring arms for the Nigerian army to fight the Islamic insurgent group.
[8] Dolarian was charged and arrested on 15 May 2019 because the US Department of State had not given his company the compulsory international arms deal brokering licenses required for contracts signed with NSA vendor Societe d'Equipmente Internationaux in 2014.However, the High Court of Nigeria in August 2022 found Societe d'Equipmente Internationaux innocent of charges and returned all frozen assets held by the EFCC.
[11] The committee analyzed how funds were transferred to the offices of the National Security Adviser and the Nigerian Armed Forces in local and foreign currencies.
[13] The amount of foreign currency spent on failed contracts was more than twice the $1 billion loan approved by the National Assembly for borrowing from the World Bank to fight insurgencies.
[14] The investigative committee discovered a total transfer of ₦3.850 billion to a single company by Colonel Dasuki, the former National Security Adviser.
The committee also noted that Dasuki directed the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to transfer a total sum of $132,050,486.97 and £9,905,473.50 to the accounts of the Societe D'equipmente Internationaux in West Africa, the UK, and the US with no documentation.
[15] Subsequent to this interim report, President Buhari ordered the arrest of Colonel Dasuki for the alleged siphoning of billions of dollars allocated for the procurement of arms.
[18] On 3 November 2015, Justice Adeniyi Ademola ordered the DSS to release his passport to enable him to travel for medical attention.
"[22] On 30 November 2015, Ambassador Bashir Yuguda was arrested and detained by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in connection with the arms procurement deal mentioned by Colonel Dasuki.
[23] Preliminary evidence showed that Ambassador Yuguda received ₦1.5 billion from the National Security Adviser with no coherent basis for the financial transaction.
After Dasuki was transferred to the EFCC, he initially decided not to comment on the issue or write any statement, claiming that he had been subjected to a media trial.
[30] He mentioned Chief Raymond Dopesi, the chair emeritus of DAAR Communications, alongside Attahiru Bafarawa and Bashir Yuguda.
[31] Chief Raymond Dopesi was arrested at his residence in Abuja by the EFCC in connection with the arms procurement deal mentioned by Colonel Dasuki.
[32] Preliminary evidence showed that Chief Dopesi received ₦2.1 billion between October 2014 and March 2015 from the office of the National Security Adviser with no coherent reasons for the financial transaction.
Chief Dopesi said that the ₦2.1 billion received from the Office of the National Security Adviser was payment for media and political campaigns for the re-election of President Goodluck Jonathan.
[36] On 1 December 2015, Attahiru Bafarawa, the former Governor of Sokoto State, was arrested and detained by the EFCC in connection with the arms procurement deal mentioned by Colonel Dasuki.
[37] Evidence showed that Attahiru Bafarawa received ₦4.6 billion from the office of the National Security Adviser with no clear basis for the financial transaction.
[48] While speaking in Washington, D.C., on "Presidential elections and democratic consolidation in Africa: Case studies on Nigeria and Tanzania", a forum co-hosted by the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs and the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Goodluck Jonathan refuted the allegations by the EFCC and its operative that he awarded a contract potentially worth $2 billion for arms procurement during his administration.
[50] The second Vice President of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, Mr. Monday Ubani, suggested, "That is why some of us are of the opinion that if some of Jonathan's men have been mentioned in the course of investigation, the best thing for the EFCC to do is invite him to come and make useful statements.
Dasuki to go to the CBN and collect the sum of $47m in cash and the balance in Euro and the directive was obeyed and the monies were delivered to the NSA in about 11 suit cases.
According to him, the beneficiaries includes Yerima Abdullahi, Chief Bode George, Peter Odili, Jim Nwobodo, Attahiru Bafarawa, and Ahmadu Ali.
[53] He transferred ₦300 million to BAM Properties, whose account details were sent to him by Bello Haliru, a former National Chairman of the People's Democratic Party.
Bashir's confessional statement reads: For the cash disbursement of ₦600million, it was meant for the six zonal chairmen for Contact and Mobilisation Committees for Election of 2015.
I shall endeavour to recover the sum of N600million given to the six zonal PDP committee chairmen, while I appeal to the commission to use their machineries to trace the remaining balance of the money transferred to various accounts.
[55][56] In a counterclaim, Chief Bode George denied the allegations of receiving a total sum of ₦100 million from Yuguda for the 2015 general election.
[57] Bode's statement reads:My attention has been drawn to another mischievous and deliberately fraudulent claim that I collected N100 million from Bashir Yuguda, the former Minister of State for Finance.
The committee which was made up of 18 senior members of the party with distinguished history of honour and exemplary leadership, met at least 10 times in my office in Lagos.
