INVESTIGATIONS into the controversial $182m Halliburton bribery scandal have revealed that the $26.5m plea bargain money received from the oil servicing company was not paid into any of the federal government's accounts.

In one of Nigeria's biggest ever bribery scandals, Halliburton was alleged to have bribed government ministers to get awarded an oil contract. When the matter came to light in the US, Halliburton's former chief executive Mark Fish, entered into a plea bargain, which involved paying $26.5m to get charges dropped.

 Originally, Jeffery Tessler, the UK-based lawyer who handled the distribution of the bribe money to the persons indicted through Swiss accounts, was among those convicted in the US and sentenced to 21 years in prison after pleading guilty to corruption charges in 2012. The scandal blew open following a bid by Halliburton to win a $6bn contract for the engineering design and construction of the Bonny Island Liquefied Natural Gas project.

 Since assuming office, President Muhammadu Buhari has reopened investigations into the case and sources closer to the matter say the money paid by Halliburton in a bid to evade prosecution, may have been shared by three prominent Nigerians. According to the source, consequent upon the sharing, the Federal Ministry of Justice organised what was described as a kangaroo prosecution of a former special assistant to an erstwhile president but he was discharged and acquitted. 

 “The ploy was to use the former special assistant as scapegoat with a view to causing diversion and allowing the big culprits to escape justice,” the source added. He pointed out that the prominent Nigerians who shared the money include a former anti-corruption chief and a former minister.

 US government officials have recently informed the Nigerian government that over $142m of the bribery money was still in their hands and some European nations but that the money would only be returned if all those involved in the scandal were prosecuted. They reportedly based their argument on the fact that all those from the US involved in the bribery scam had been prosecuted and money recovered from them.