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| Atiku |
An international tribunal has spotlighted a $500,000 transfer made in 2003 to the then-wife of former Nigerian Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, calling it a major warning sign in a long-running dispute over the massive Mambilla hydroelectric project.
In simple terms, the story goes like this. Leno Adesanya, the man behind Sunrise Power and Transmission Company, wanted the big contract to build and run the 2,600-megawatt Mambilla power plant in Taraba State. The project was estimated to cost around $4.5 billion and had been discussed for years. Adesanya was actively lobbying Nigerian officials, including then-Vice-President Atiku, as far back as 2001. Atiku even led a government team to China in 2002 that discussed the project with Chinese partners.
On 30 January 2003, Adesanya transferred $500,000 from a Swiss bank account belonging to his offshore company, China Castle Investments Ltd, into a US bank account held by Jennifer Douglas Abubakar, Atiku’s wife at the time. Less than four months later, in May 2003, then Power Minister Olu Agunloye issued a letter that Sunrise claimed was an award of a build-operate-transfer (BOT) contract for Mambilla.
When Nigeria challenged Sunrise’s claims at the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) tribunal in Paris, the company and Adesanya did not deny the payment. Adesanya said it was simply a foreign-exchange deal he arranged for Atiku through his bureau-de-change business. He claimed the talks were oral and that, more than 20 years later, he had no paperwork left.
The tribunal rejected that explanation. It found no bank records showing any naira coming in, no exchange-rate details, no instructions from Atiku or his aides, no correspondence, and no commercial documents to prove the deal was genuine. Neither Atiku nor Jennifer Douglas gave any statement supporting the story. The panel also noted that China Castle itself was not licensed for foreign-exchange work.
Because of the timing, Adesanya’s close dealings with Atiku over Mambilla, and the complete lack of supporting evidence, the tribunal said the facts raised “significant red flags.” It could not rule out that the money was linked to Atiku’s leading role in the government’s handling of the project between 2001 and 2003. At the same time, the arbitrators made clear they found no proof that Atiku actually used his official position to push the contract through for Sunrise.
The same tribunal also looked at three smaller payments totalling about $15,000 that Adesanya later directed to Agunloye through an aide. In the end, the ICC fully rejected Sunrise’s multi-billion-dollar claims against Nigeria and ordered the company and Adesanya to pay most of Nigeria’s legal costs. The award paints a picture of persistent efforts by Adesanya to secure influence over the project through questionable payments, while stopping short of a direct corruption finding against Atiku himself.
The decision has reignited political debate in Nigeria, with the ruling party pressing Atiku for answers and Atiku insisting the tribunal never found him guilty of receiving a bribe or abusing office. The Mambilla project remains unfinished decades later, a costly reminder of how unfinished contracts and unanswered questions can linger.