The Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) Abubakar Malami, has said that the 4.2 million Pounds (about N2.4 billion) recovered from associates of the former Governor of Delta State, James Ibori, in the United Kingdom (U.K.), would soon be transferred to Nigeria.
Malami’s spokesman, Umar Gwandu, said in a statement that the delay in the repatriation of the fund agreement between the Nigerian and United Kingdom governments was partly caused by documentations in foreign banks.
He said in the statement that “Documentations with the banks in different countries often take longer than anticipated. We anticipated two weeks but we are not in control of the banks.”
The statement noted that sometimes, when a country transfers funds, it may take more than the expected time due to some documentations.
He said the government was “working assiduously” to ensure that the fund was repatriated soon.
Representatives of both the U.K. and Nigerian governments signed an agreement for the return of the money, which translates to about N2.4 billion, to Nigeria in Abuja on March 9.
The signing of the agreement at the Federal Ministry of Justice, Abuja, was done under the auspices of the U.K.-Nigeria Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which came into force in 2016.
