Former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, SAN, has dismissed allegations by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) that he duplicated the recovery process for the $310 million Abacha loot, which eventually grew to $322.5 million with interest.
Gatekeepers News reports that in a statement issued by his media aide, Mohammed Doka, Malami described the EFCC’s claims as “baseless, illogical, and devoid of substance,” arguing that the accusations crumble under factual examination.
He said the EFCC alleged that he repeated a recovery process supposedly concluded by Swiss lawyer Enrico Monfrini before he assumed office in 2015—an assertion he insists is false.
According to Malami, a recovery is only complete when the funds are formally lodged into the Federation Account, and as of 2016, no such deposit had been made.
“As at 2016, there was no lodgement of any such funds into the Federation Account. There was therefore no completed recovery in existence, and nothing whatsoever to duplicate,” he stated.
Malami further pointed out that Monfrini himself applied in December 2016 to be re-engaged for the same recovery effort—evidence, he said, that contradicts the EFCC’s narrative.
“It is entirely illogical for a lawyer to apply in December 2016 to be engaged to recover funds he purportedly recovered two years earlier. That singular fact exposes the internal contradiction and absurdity of the EFCC’s narrative,” he added.
He revealed that Monfrini demanded a $5 million upfront payment and a 40 percent success fee—later negotiated down to 20 percent—terms rejected by the Buhari administration. Instead, government engaged a Nigerian law firm on a 5 percent success-fee arrangement, which Malami said saved the country between 15 and 35 percent of the total recovered funds, amounting to between ₦76.8 billion and ₦179.2 billion.
The former AGF also explained that he supervised multiple tranches of Abacha loot recovery, including $322.5 million repatriated from Switzerland between 2017 and 2018 and deployed to Conditional Cash Transfers under a World Bank-supervised plan, as well as about $321 million returned from Jersey in 2020 for major infrastructure projects such as the Lagos–Ibadan Expressway, Abuja–Kano Road, and the Second Niger Bridge.
Malami said attempts to conflate these separate recoveries or portray a lawful, cost-saving process as duplication were misleading. He maintained that all actions taken under his tenure were within the constitutional powers of the Attorney-General and in the public interest, stressing that allegations of money laundering or abuse of office lacked any reasonable basis.
Describing the EFCC investigation as a political witch-hunt, Malami thanked his supporters for their solidarity. He confirmed honouring an EFCC invitation on November 28, 2025, which he described as a “fruitful engagement,” expressing confidence that the probe would eventually vindicate him.
