{"id":543,"date":"2019-08-30T14:54:25","date_gmt":"2019-08-30T14:54:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/streiner.mx\/?post_type=caso_estudio&p=543"},"modified":"2021-07-19T21:13:34","modified_gmt":"2021-07-19T21:13:34","slug":"political-corruption-in-nigeria-sani-abacha","status":"publish","type":"caso_estudio","link":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/case_study\/political-corruption-in-nigeria-sani-abacha\/","title":{"rendered":"Political Corruption in Nigeria: Sani Abacha"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Context<\/strong><\/p>\n

During the mid-twentieth century, Nigeria was in constant political instability due to an important amount of coup d\u2019etats.<\/p>\n

In November of 1993, Sani Abacha seized power and became the president and subsequent dictator of Nigeria until 1998 (Timeline, 2019).<\/p>\n

Facts: Who gave what to whom and why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Throughout his five years of rule, Abacha was involved in a series of corruption scandals, however, it was not until he died when it was discovered that he had taken around USD $3,000 y USD $5,000 millions from Nigeria\u2019s public resources. According to Nigeria\u2019s authorities, Abacha\u2019s family, associates and he himself had deposited the money in some of the most important banks in London (Pallister & Capella, 2000).<\/p>\n

Nigeria\u2019s government managed to recover recuperar USD $1,000 millions thanks to the Abacha\u2019s son, Muhammad, who confessed his father gave him USD $700 millions in cash for a two-year period (Pallister & Capella, 2000).<\/p>\n

According to UD Department of Justice, the money \u00a0stolen by Abacha\u00a0 was laundered through purchase of government bonds which were backed by US financial institutions \u00a0(Transparency, 2014).<\/p>\n

Moreover, Nigeria\u2019s government estimates that USD$2,300 million were taken by the Central Bank,\u00a0 USD $1,000 million are related to public procurement and\u00a0 USD $1,000 million were taken through foreign company extorsions.<\/p>\n

Abacha\u2019s associates cashed out the money and deposited into US financial institutions and late Abacha and his finance minister bought inflated government bonds through a company controlled by Abacha himself (Transparency, 2014).<\/p>\n\"\"\n\"\"\n

Applicable Law<\/strong><\/p>\n

United Nations Convention Against Corruption<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00bfWhy is this case relevant?<\/strong><\/p>\n

This case has huge relevance as it is considered the biggest case of corruption perpetrated by a government. Nigeria\u2019s case has exposed the global financial system in relation to money laundering monitoring.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, the present case is relevant because of the contribution of various government to Nigeria\u2019s asset recovery. For example, last year Switzerland recovered USD $322 millions from Abacha\u2019s bank accounts (Pallister & Capella, 2000).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Lessons learned<\/strong><\/p>\n

This case shows an unprecedented level of corruption perpetrated by a government that must serve as a lesson to implement more efficient measures against public officials that act in a corrupt manner.<\/p>\n

Also, Nigeria\u2019s case of an example of mutual legal assistance stolen asset recovery assistance and money laundering monitoring due to the fact that countries such as Switzerland, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein froze Abacha\u2019s family accounts.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What type of corruption is it and what are the crimes involved?<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, this case involves embezzlement, which occurs when a person holding office in an institution dishonestly and illegally appropriates, uses or traffics the fund they have been entrusted with for a personal enrichment (Anticorruption, s.f.). Let\u2019s not forget that Abacha and his family took USD$2,300 million from Nigeria\u2019s Central Bank, USD $1,000 million in public procurement and USD$1,000 million for extortions, all for personal enrichment.<\/p>\n

Second, the case involved extortion, which is the act of utilizing, either directly or indirectly, one\u2019s access to a position of power to demand unmerited compensation, usually as result of coercive threats (Anticorruption, s.f.). Abacha used USD$1,000 million in order to extort foreign companies.<\/p>\n

Third, Abacha\u2019s actions show that this is a case of grand and political corruption due to the fact that the size of the transactions involve more money than bureaucratic corruption (Anticorruption, s.f.).<\/p>\n\"\"\n\"\"\n

References (Harvard – Anglia)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Pallister, D. &. C. P., 2000. The Guardian. <\/em>[Online]
\nAvailable at: https:\/\/bit.ly\/2lBIk20<\/p>\n

International, T., 2019. Transparency International the global coalition against corruption. <\/em>[Online]<\/p>\n

BBC, 2019. BBC.<\/em> [Online]
\nAvailable at: https:\/\/bbc.in\/2Mqynfz<\/p>\n

Justice, T. U. S. D. o., 2019. The United States Department of Justice. <\/em>[Online]
\nAvailable at: https:\/\/bit.ly\/2kh2D4T<\/p>\n

International, T., 2019. Transparency International the global coalition against corruption.<\/em> [Online]
\nAvailable at: https:\/\/www.transparency.org\/en\/news\/25-corruption-scandals#Ben%20Ali<\/p>\n

Abogados, D., s.f. Glosario de Derecho Anticorrupci\u00f3n. <\/em>[Online]
\nAvailable at: Ebook<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Context During the mid-twentieth century, Nigeria was in constant political instability due to an important amount of coup d\u2019etats. In November of 1993, Sani Abacha seized power and became the president and subsequent dictator of Nigeria until 1998 (Timeline, 2019). Facts: Who gave what to whom and why? Throughout his five years of rule, Abacha […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"template":"","categoria_caso_estudio":[153,141],"class_list":["post-543","caso_estudio","type-caso_estudio","status-publish","hentry","categoria_caso_estudio-money-laundering","categoria_caso_estudio-political-corruption-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/caso_estudio\/543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/caso_estudio"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/caso_estudio"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"categoria_caso_estudio","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/streiner.mx\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categoria_caso_estudio?post=543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}