Nigeria’s Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has granted a final forfeiture of United Kingdom property allegedly linked to former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Jeremiah Useni, to Nigerian government, bringing to a close a protracted legal process surrounding the asset.
Presiding judge, Justice Binta Nyako, in her ruling, declared that the property located at 79 Randall Avenue, Neasden, London, was reasonably believed to have been acquired through proceeds of unlawful activities.
The case, initiated by the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), followed an order of interim forfeiture earlier issued by the court.
The court had earlier on directed a publication of the interim forfeiture order in a national newspaper to enable any interested party to contest the move, and the bureau had subsequently applied for a final forfeiture after no individual or organisation came forward to lay claim to the property.
But, at the resumed hearing, counsel to the bureau informed the court that no objections or claims had been filed against the forfeiture.
In granting the application, Justice Nyako held that the bureau had sufficiently established its case and that there was no legal impediment to making the forfeiture permanent.
The property has also been at the centre of a separate controversy involving Mike Ozekhome, SAN, who had previously claimed that it was gifted to him by an individual identified as “Tali Shani.”
However, findings from a United Kingdom tribunal, which were presented before the court, reportedly revealed that the name “Tali Shani” was fictitious and that no such person existed.
The tribunal was said to have linked the property directly to Useni.
Further submissions by the Code of Conduct Bureau indicated that an assessment of Useni’s declared earnings, using remuneration benchmarks from the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission, exposed a significant gap between his legitimate income and the value of the London property.
According to the bureau, the discrepancy reinforced suspicions that the asset could not have been lawfully acquired.
With the court ruling, the property has now been permanently forfeited to the Federal Government, effectively extinguishing any competing claims over its ownership.