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Atiku Abubakar

17.11.2022 Featured FLASHBACK: The Dollar Link Between Jailed US Congressman Jefferson and Atiku Abubakar

Published 17th Nov, 2022

By Segun Ige

On November 13, 2009, the US District Court of Virginia, through Judge T.S. Ellis III, sentenced Congressman William J. Jefferson to 13 years in prison for bribery and corruption after a thoroughgoing investigation conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

For “his stunning betrayal of public trust”, the court in a 37-page document charged Jefferson on eleven counts including money laundering, racketeering, and conspiracy with African governments in a bid to promote and expand his “telecommunications deals in Nigeria, Ghana, and elsewhere; oil concessions in Equatorial Guinea; satellite transmission contracts in Botswana, Equatorial Guinea and the Republic of Congo; and development of different plants and facilities in Nigeria”.

“His crimes included no fewer than eleven distinct bribe schemes as well as a conspiracy involving an extraordinarily and historically unprecedented agreement to bribe the then-sitting Vice President of Nigeria, Atiku Abubabar.”

Jefferson, a Louisiana Democratic House of Representative member who described Abubabar as “really corrupt”, had sold his congressional office as a “criminal enterprise to enrich himself by soliciting and accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to support his business ventures in Africa”.

The FBI, serving as a reliable information to the court, had opened an investigation on Jefferson, having learnt that a sitting member of the congress was “using his official position to solicit bribes from American companies interested in doing business in Africa”.

In 2005, after consensual monitoring since year 2000, court-authorised electronic surveillance, and analysis of financial records, the FBI concluded that Jefferson was caught on camera taking $100,000 in cash from Lori Mody, a cooperating witness (CW) of the FBI, who had fallen victim of the investment scheme with the iGate technology firm owned by Vernon Jackson.

Mody, who owned an educational technology philanthropic foundation, and whose mission was to provide technology to schools nationwide, starting from its base Virginia, had hired Brett Pfeffer, a former aide to Jefferson, to help explore various investment opportunities in order to finance the philanthropy.

With the intention of investing so she could support her foundation, Mody had approached Jackson, the CEO of Kentucky-based iGate communications technology company, which enabled audio, video and date to be transmitted over copper wires, for advice. Jackson demanded a sum of $3.5million, which Mody paid to Jackson with the understanding that Jackson wanted to use it to acquire iGate’s exclusive rights from Netlink Digital Television (NDTV) to distribute iGate technology in Nigeria.

On July 21, 2005, after Jefferson had met with Abubakar in person in Maryland on July 18, Jefferson and Mody went to a Tysons restaurant in Virginia to discuss the outcome of the Jefferson-Atiku conclusions on the business plans.

In the first FBI surveillance videotape obtained by FIJ, Jefferson told Mody that Vice President Abubabar wanted to have 12.5% interest of the money that would be earned collectively by iGate, Roscom.Net, and a proposed US company Jefferson said would be her Nigerian business and would be named ‘W2-IBBS’.

“Do we have a deal with Nigeria, because this back-and-forth doesn’t make me feel we have things showed up? Do we have a deal with, you know, with, with, you know, the VP of Nigeria first?” Mody asked.

“Uh, yes, we do have a deal with him,” Jefferson replied.

“Excellent, okay,” said Mody.

“Um, I’m gonna see him again before we go, and uh, we have a deal with him on the back end and, maybe, I know what we’re playing with …on the front end…,” said Jefferson.

“Okay. All right. Now I think, uh, I think, I just want to be sure it wasn’t going to grow or get larger or… and that you feel confident he’ll do what he says he’s gonna do. He has your, you know, trust and confidence. And that’s all I need to know,” said Mody.

“We spent a lot of time talking about it. I spent a lot of time thinking about it…There’s a lot more on the back end than on the front end,” said Jefferson.

“I think it’s good he has something on the front end, though, just as a motivating factor. So he doesn’t forget what he’s working for. That’s good,” said Mody.

The second videotape surveillance released by the FBI also revealed that on the morning of July 30, 2005, Jefferson and Mody had met in a hotel, the Ritz-Carlton Pentagon City, Arlington Virginia. The FBI videotape obtained by FIJ revealed how Jefferson, who had promised to use his “official acts” in exchange for the “things of value”, collected a brown-colour leather briefcase worth $100,000 from Mody, put in a reddish-brown cloth bag.

“Would you like to take a peek at it, or whatever?” Mody asked as Jefferson removed the briefcase from the car trunk.

“I would not,” replied Jefferson.

“Well, I hope that, uh, that’s exactly what the VP needs to make him, uh, work hard for us, ” said Mody.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jefferson said.

Mody, who later became FBI’s informant, narrates in an affidavit filed in U.S. District Court of Maryland that the $100,000 bribe was part of the “front end” $500,000 bribe to be given to then Vice President Atiku Abubakar, who had promised them to support and approve the iGate’s Triple Play communications technology in Nigeria.

According to the 39-page affidavit signed by the US District Court of Maryland, Jefferson promised communication with President Olusegun Obasanjo and Vice President Atiku Abubakar in an effort to secure the iGate business venture in the country. The affidavit also mentions specific items that would be recovered in Abubakar’s home, including “cash in $100 denominations or higher” and “a new reddish-brown colour cloth bag” containing “a reddish-brown colour briefcase” of $100,000 bribe.

Jefferson also promised sending letters to Abubakar, seeking his assistance in winning over the government-owned telecommunications companies, namely, the NDTV and the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), with Abubakar negotiating a “back end” 50% profit from a Nigerian private partner company, Roscom Telecommunications Nigeria Limited, and a “front end” $500,000 payment from Jefferson before the start of business.

In “William Jefferson’s letter to Vice President Atiku Abubakar”, Jefferson proposed how “a US company desires to invest over USD $60,000,000 to provide the high speed internet service to Nigeria over NITEL’s copper wire infrastructure. Under the proposal, there would be no costs to NITEL or the Federal Republic of Nigeria”.

“To the contrary, the project proposes to pay substantial amount to NITEL for the use of its copper wire and for the co-location of D-Slam and switches at NITEL facilities of approximately USD $5,000,000 in Year 1; USD $28,000,000 in Year 2; USD $69,000,000 Year 3; USD $103,000,000 in Year 4; and USD $106,000.000 in Year 5, and thereafter.”

On July 15, 2005, Jefferson met in person with Abubakar at his home resident in 9731 Sorrel Avenue, Potomac, Maryland 20854-4732. On August 1, 2005, Jefferson told Modi in cryptic language that the “African art” ($100,000 “front end” part bribe) had been delivered to Vice President Abubakar.

At a meeting in June 2004, Jefferson described to Mody iGate’s Triple Play technology was able to provide audio, video and data transmissions services to all subscribers in Nigeria. He also explained that iGate technology needed an investor for a business it was planning to establish in Nigeria, which they (Jackson and Jefferson) said would cost $50million.

Of the $100,000 given to Jefferson, the FBI found $90,000 in Jefferson’s freezer miserably wrapped in aluminum foil and concealed inside some pie crust boxes, when it raided his residence on the permission of the court.

Edward S. Cooper, who had appeared as a cooperating witness with the FBI as ‘Lori Mody’, exposed other demands of Jefferson, who said Abubakar was determined to possess 25% “on the back end” profit of the Nigerian Roscom company, whose Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Suleiman Yahyah, was cooperatively willing to work out an agreement with NITEL’s managing director for the iGate business deals, and who most pronouncedly was on Abubakar’s “back end”.

In September 2006, then President Olusegun Obasanjo sent a letter to the National Assembly as regards the bribery and corruption scandal between Jefferson and Abubakar, which instantiated the probing of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under Nuhu Ribadu’s supervision with regard to Abubakar money theft from the Petroleum Trust Development Funds (PTDF).

In 2007, after Abubakar had truncated Obasanjo’s third-term presidency renewal, Obasanjo pointed out that Abubakar had been diverting $145 million funds from the PTDF into private companies, billions of which was transferred to NDTV as a bribe to the telecommunications to cooperate with Jackson-Jefferson iGate technology business venture in Nigeria.

A 323-page document by the United States Senate permanent subcommittee on investigations stated that between 2000 and 2008, Abubakar transferred $40 million into 30 US bank accounts, opened by Jennifer Douglas, his fourth wife, from offshore cooperations, with $25 million particularly transferred by Guernsey Trust Company, Letsgo Ltd. and Sima Holding Ltd. to majorly Douglas’ US Citibank account.

The subcommittee said wire transfers sent by Letsgo Ltd. totalled about $13.1 million, while wire transfers sent by the Guernsey Trust Company totalled about $900,000. The report also says $14 million was part of the offshore transfers paid by Abubakar to the American University helping him found his own American University of Nigeria (AUN) in Yobe State in 2003.

In the 2008 letter from American University’s legal counsel, the subcommittee cited thus:

“Mr. Abubakar made payments, through Letsgo Ltd. and Guernsey Trust Company on behalf of AUN for the services American rendered pursuant to the 2003 agreement. American received payments from Letsgo totaling $13,149,758 and the Guernsey Trust Company amounting to $900,000. American [University] has had no [other] dealings with these companies.”

FIJ reached out to Mr. Adejare Egunjobi, then Abuja Accounting Officer of NTDV, on whose behalf Jefferson had written a letter on March 3, 2004, to the Consular Section, US Consulate General, Lagos, for permission to come over to New York City to complete the iGate’s broadband telecommunications project. All he could say on the phone was “wrong number”.

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Published 17th Nov, 2022

By Segun Ige

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