FG demands $1.1b from Eni, Shell for Malabu

The Federal Government has asked a Milan court to order Eni and Royal Dutch Shell to pay the sum of $1.092 billion as an immediate advance payment for damages over the OPL 245 Malabu offshore field.

At the hearing into the alleged corruption around the 2011 acquisition by Eni and Shell of the OPL 245 offshore field, Lucio Lucia, the lawyer for the Federal Government, called for the advance payment ahead of a broader damages package to be set by the court at a later date.

The long-running case revolves around the purchase of the OPL 245 offshore field,  about 150 kilometres off the Niger Delta, for about $1.3 billion from Malabu, a company owned by former oil minister Dan Etete.

Prosecutors allege that about $1.1 billion of that money was siphoned off to politicians and middlemen, half of it to Etete.

Shell, however, claims that the 2011 deal was a settlement of long-standing litigation, following the previous allocation of the block by the government to Shell and Malabu.

In July, prosecutors in the case asked for Eni and Shell to be fined and some of their present and former executives, including Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi, to be jailed.

They also requested the confiscation of a total of $1.092 billion from all the defendants in the case, the equivalent of the bribes alleged to have been paid. Lucia joined up to the request for seizure of that amount yesterday.

Meanwhile, Etete, Eni, Shell, and the managers accused in the Milan court case, including Descalzi, have all denied any wrongdoing.