{"id":14507,"date":"2017-05-24T19:38:27","date_gmt":"2017-05-24T19:38:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=14507"},"modified":"2017-05-24T19:38:27","modified_gmt":"2017-05-24T19:38:27","slug":"us-court-battle-over-arms-import-exposes-massive-corruption-in-the-nigeria-army","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=14507","title":{"rendered":"US COURT BATTLE OVER ARMS IMPORT EXPOSES MASSIVE CORRUPTION IN THE NIGERIA ARMY"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The claims read like the plot of a best-selling thriller, with secretive arms dealers and a corruption-riddled government fighting jihadists.<\/p>\n<p>The weapons deal collapses in acrimony but instead of a shoot-out, the embittered parties fight it out in court.<\/p>\n<p>In this real life saga, Ara Dolarian is the US arms dealer, Hima Aboubakar the weapons contractor and the foreign government Nigeria, which has been locked in a battle with Boko Haram since 2009.<\/p>\n<p>The $246 million (221 million euros) order at the height of the jihadists&#8217; insurgency in 2014 was for weapons and equipment, including helicopters, bombs and ammunition.<\/p>\n<p>It could have given over-stretched and under-resourced Nigerian troops a boost, as the better-armed rebels captured territory across northeast Nigeria, often without a fight.<\/p>\n<p>But the deal collapsed in 2015 and the arms never arrived. Aboubakar sued Dolarian for fraud in California.<\/p>\n<p>Aboubakar, a national of Niger, claimed the US arms dealer failed to ship $8.6 million worth of bombs and rockets, damaging his reputation as &#8220;a trusted arms supplier to the Nigerian military&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Dolarian alleges in court documents that he was unwittingly caught up in a &#8220;money laundering scheme&#8221; and that Aboubakar&#8217;s arms money was &#8220;stolen from the Nigerian government&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><code><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- www.deltanewsroom.com --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-2163942495525027\" data-ad-slot=\"1411897411\" data-ad-format=\"auto\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/code><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Rare glimpse &#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Campaign group Transparency International described corruption in the defence procurement sector as &#8220;the new diesel for Nigeria&#8217;s kleptocrats&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>It estimated that more than $15 billion has been stolen, &#8220;leaving the military without vital equipment, insufficiently trained, low in morale and under-resourced&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This has crippled the Nigerian military,&#8221; it added in a new report published on Thursday, which defence spokesman John Enenche rejected and described as &#8220;a sweeping allegation&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The defence ministry now did &#8220;government-to-government&#8221; deals and no longer used contractors, he added.<\/p>\n<p>The court battle between Dalorian and Aboubakar some 12,500 kilometres (8,000 miles) from Abuja offers a rare glimpse into the shadowy world of the arms trade.<\/p>\n<p>It could also shed light on how an alleged multi-billion-dollar fraud in the office of former national security advisor Sambo Dasuki might have taken place.<\/p>\n<p>Pieter Wezeman, a researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, said Dolarian&#8217;s deal with Aboubakar and his company Societe d&#8217;Equipments Internationaux (SEI) &#8220;rings alarm bells&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Court documents show SEI signed off on the purchase of six Mi-24 and Mi-35 helicopters from Dolarian for $25 million each, which Wezeman said was far above their normal value of $5 million each.<\/p>\n<p>Inflated prices open the door to graft, he added. &#8220;This is really a ridiculous price,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Endemic corruption &#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Current President Muhammadu Buhari&#8217;s predecessor Goodluck Jonathan and his administration were forced to take Boko Haram seriously after the kidnapping of more than 200 schoolgirls from the remote town of Chibok.<\/p>\n<p>The mass abduction in April 2014 drew the world&#8217;s attention to the conflict, sending the government on a shopping spree for weapons.<\/p>\n<p>Buhari, a former military head of state, honed in on the notoriously rotten defence procurement sector after coming to power on an anti-corruption platform in 2015.<\/p>\n<p>Dasuki has been accused of orchestrating a sprawling embezzlement scheme that saw &#8220;phantom contracts&#8221; awarded for personal and political gain.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=13264&amp;ad_type=59&amp;rl=180\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Shocking scale &#8211;<\/p>\n<p>The scale of the alleged scam and how officials apparently exploited the insurgency shocked even Nigerians wearily familiar with corruption scandals.<\/p>\n<p>Dasuki and scores of other defence officials were arrested and put on trial. Buhari&#8217;s government then went after procurement firms.<\/p>\n<p>Last year, a committee set up by Buhari said SEI played a &#8220;major&#8221; role in the alleged scam after being awarded nearly $1 billion worth of contracts &#8220;characterised by irregularity and fraud&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>SEI deals appear in many ongoing corruption cases in Nigeria.<\/p>\n<p>Two top air force officials are charged with bribery for accepting cash and a Range Rover from the company.<\/p>\n<p>Aboubakar has not been charged and told AFP: &#8220;We continue to work with the Nigerian army. Forget about what the people say, they lie.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-14508\" src=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army-300x200.jpg 300w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army-768x512.jpg 768w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army-272x182.jpg 272w, http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army.jpg 810w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; &#8216;Excessive secrecy&#8217; &#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Repeated adjournments have become a feature of the separate trials linked to the Dasuki &#8220;arms scam&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>As time goes by without a big name conviction, there are doubts about whether a significant dent will be made in Nigeria&#8217;s culture of corruption.<\/p>\n<p>Buhari himself &#8212; the driving force of the anti-graft campaign &#8212; is wrestling with ill health.<\/p>\n<p>Nigeria specialist Matthew Page said Buhari was not reforming a system of embezzlement &#8220;codified&#8221; by former military rulers such as Sani Abacha.<\/p>\n<p>Habits that saw many senior officers get rich over decades of military rule persist, despite the return to democracy in 1999, he said.<\/p>\n<p>Nearly two decades later, the defence sector is still secretive, with little or no oversight and transparency, and arms procurement still requires ad hoc approvals from the executive.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Buhari is a dyed-in-the-wool military guy,&#8221; said Page, a former US State Department official.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;All these issues, excessive secrecy and the notion that the military operates by different rules, these are principles that Buhari prescribes to pretty closely.&#8221;(http:\/\/www.dailymail.co.uk)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The claims read like the plot of a best-selling thriller, with secretive arms dealers and a corruption-riddled government fighting jihadists. The weapons deal collapses in acrimony but instead of a shoot-out, the embittered parties fight it out in court. In this real life saga, Ara Dolarian is the US arms dealer, Hima Aboubakar the weapons [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":14508,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[3814,3815],"class_list":["post-14507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","tag-ara-dolarian","tag-hima-aboubakar"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/05\/nigerian-army.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-3LZ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14507"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14507\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14509,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14507\/revisions\/14509"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}