The ongoing Pandora Papers investigation money laundry report traced four London properties worth £6.7 million to the representative of Anambra North senatorial district in and former minister of aviation, Ms Stella Odua.
At the current exchange rate of N775 (black market) to a pound sterling, it amounts to about N5.2 billion or N3.74 billion at the official exchange rate of N558 to a pound sterling.
The revelation is based on leaked records obtained from collaboration with UK-based Finance Uncovered within the larger Pandora Papers Investigation coordinated by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
According to the report, Oduah who was minister between 2011 and 2014 used International Trading and Logistics Company Limited (ITCL), incorporated in Seychelles and commonly used as secrecy and tax haven, to acquire the properties.
As a minister, she allegedly and secretly acquired the London properties, hiding behind an anonymous company she tucked away offshore.
Recall that different Nigerian courts have ordered the freezing of assets linked to Oduah in Nigeria over her indebtedness to banks while the four anonymously acquired London properties – alongside one other bought in her own name and two others bought in the name of her Nigerian-registered company – remain owned by her.
The assets are blocked from debt recovery efforts by banks and the Assets Management Company of Nigeria, AMCON.
Anonymous acquisitions would ensure she circumvented due diligence checks in the UK about the sources of her funds as a politically exposed person.
Also, anonymity, that is, hiding behind the Seychelles-incorporated company, meant she could avoid possible investigation and prosecution in Nigeria for owning undeclared assets or acquiring as a public servant any assets not attributable to legitimate income.
According to the UK Land Registry records, ITCL bought on October 19, 2012, a house at 23 St Edmunds Terrace, London NW8 7QA for 5.3 million pounds.
Then, in the following year, 2013, between August 6 and 15, the following three more properties were bought in the name of ITCL:
– Flat 2, 7 Devonshire Terrace, London (W2 3DN)
Bought: on or around 06/08/2013
Price paid: £378,000.
– Top Floor Flat, 89 Brondesbury Villas, London (NW6 6AG)
Bought: on or around 12/08/2013
Price paid: £369,000.
– Fourth Floor Flat, 19 Warrington Crescent, London (W9 1ED)
Bought: on or around 15/08/2013
Price paid: £680,000.
Records show that none of the four properties was bought with mortgage financing.
It therefore means that the Anambra lawmaker routed £6.7 million through her offshore company to anonymously effect the acquisitions.
Oduah’s houses are among the 234 UK properties investigation showed were anonymously acquired by offshore companies, with Nigerians as ultimate beneficial owners.
The investigation exposed the hidden identities of the true owners of the properties bought in the so-called envelope structure that offers confidentiality benefits, which in the case of Nigerian public servants like Oduah, mean a way of blocking the code of conduct bureau from knowing undeclared assets.
By law, public servants in Nigeria are required to declare their assets and are forbidden from holding directorship of any company except the interest is in agriculture.
In addition, any asset acquired after the declaration of assets must be “fairly attributable” to legitimate income, failing which, such acquisition is deemed to be in breach of the law.
It remained unclear how Ms Oduah raised the funds to purchase the properties. As she did not respond to our enquiry, it remained unclear if she declared some or all of the properties and the offshore company ITCL to the Code of Conduct of Bureau (CCB).
Oduah was yet to react to the allegations.
Recall that Oduah who recently defected from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) lost her ministerial job on February 12, 2014 after she was indicted by two panels, which probed the purchase of two bullet-proof cars by Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) for N255 million in violation of Nigeria’s public procurement and appropriation laws.
The agency was under her supervision as the minister of aviation.
The two panels were the house of representatives committee on aviation headed by Mrs. Nkiru Onyejiocha and a presidential panel headed by former head of the civil service of the federation, Mr. Bello Isa.
Before her acquisition of the four properties, Oduah had on March 8, 2006, bought in her own name Apartment 209, Cavendish House, 31 Monck Street, London SW1P 2AS for 700 thousand pounds, Land Registry record shows.
She Oduah worked with the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company, a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for seven years before establishing her Lagos-based Sea Petroleum and Gas Company Limited (SPGCL).
She also owns International Trading and Logistics Company Limited, exactly the same name as the company she anonymously incorporated in Seychelles. She was elected senator in 2019, representing Anambra North District.
On September 14, 2012, about one month before the purchase of the 5.3 million pounds Edmund Terrace property, SPGCL wired $71,973 bank transfer to Daniel Ford & Co., a UK property agency commonly used by Nigerian business and political elites investing in the UK property market anonymously, according to a leaked suspicious activity report submitted by Deutsche Bank to the U.S. financial intelligence agency FinCEN.
Deutsche Bank had helped facilitate the U.S. dollar transfer, acting as a correspondent bank. Reporting that Ms Oduah is the owner of SPGCL in its suspicious activity report, Deutsche Bank said it suspected the payment to Daniel Ford was money laundering.
Meanwhile, as she used ITCL Seychelles, she also invested in the UK property market through ITCL Nigeria, also while serving as minister. On July 12, 2011, just days after her assumption of office as aviation minister, she used ITCL Nigeria to buy Flats 303 and 306 Grant House, 90 Liberty Street, London SW9 0BZ for 475 thousand pounds each.
Thus, a total of seven London properties are connected to the Anambra politician – one in her name in 2006, two through her Nigerian-incorporated ITCL in 2011, and four secretly through her Seychelles offshore ITCL between 2012 and 2013 – according to records from the UK Land Registry and leaked offshore documents – which helped expose her as the ultimate beneficial owner of the Seychelles company.
With Premium Times report
