ABUJA Saturday 19 September 2026
The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council has declared Atiku Abubakar unfit to be President of Nigeria after an International Chamber of Commerce arbitration tribunal in Paris delivered findings on the stalled Mambilla hydropower project.
In a statement issued on Friday by spokesman Dele Alake the council said the African Democratic Congress candidate had again shown he would put personal financial gain ahead of Nigeria’s interests. The council pointed to hearings in the case brought by Sunrise Power and Transmission Company Ltd and Leno Adesanya over the 3960 megawatt scheme in Taraba State.
The statement alleged that Abubakar and former power minister Olu Agunloye worked together to sign an unlawful power contract with Sunrise in the closing period of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s first term. It said the contract was approved despite objections and reservations raised at the Federal Executive Council.
According to the council a payment of 500000 dollars was wired in January 2003 from an offshore company China Castle Investment to a United States Citibank account belonging to Abubakar’s then wife Jennifer Douglas. The money arrived in several transfers and later featured in a United States Senate inquiry titled Keeping Foreign Corruption out of the United States Four Case Histories. Jennifer Douglas told investigators her husband sent the funds and that she did not know the offshore company.
The APC council said the tribunal noted a close connection in time between that payment on 30 January 2003 and the alleged award of the Build Operate Transfer contract to Sunrise on 22 May 2003. After the Nigerian government declined to proceed Sunrise and Adesanya pursued claims seeking 680 million dollars as a settlement sum plus interest and a further claim exceeding 2.7 billion dollars in compensation linked to the same project.
Nigeria successfully resisted the latest claim. The tribunal rejected Sunrise’s demand that the country pay 400 million dollars under a 2020 settlement and addendum and ordered Sunrise and its promoter to refund Nigeria’s legal costs of 11.8 million dollars.
The same award examined the conduct of former Attorney General Abubakar Malami. The tribunal found that a corrupt arrangement was reached between Adesanya and Malami which tainted a settlement agreement signed on 2 January 2020 and an addendum dated 25 March 2020 that would have doubled Nigeria’s potential liability to 400 million dollars.
Adesanya told the tribunal he heard Malami and former power minister Saleh Mamman say Nigeria would pay only half the 200 million dollars at first and release the rest after he had done what is needed. The tribunal recorded that Adesanya claimed to possess audio and video recordings of the alleged solicitation but those recordings were not produced.
The tribunal said Malami failed to appear to give evidence, acted against Nigeria’s interest and was motivated by other incentives. It found he did not give President Muhammadu Buhari correct information. Buhari withheld approval in a handwritten note of 20 April 2020 stating the Federal Government had not got 200 million dollars to pay Sunrise. A further rejection marked not approved was sent on 18 January 2021. Despite those refusals Malami continued to press the case for the settlement. The tribunal also noted direct WhatsApp contact between Malami and Adesanya even though they were opposing parties.
The tribunal held that the settlement and addendum were not binding because they lacked the required presidential approval and were in any event unenforceable as products of corruption contrary to Nigerian public policy. It therefore dismissed Sunrise’s claim that Nigeria had breached those instruments.
The APC council contrasted Abubakar’s absence from the Paris hearings with the attendance of former Presidents Obasanjo and Buhari who gave evidence in Nigeria’s defence. It quoted Obasanjo’s book My Watch in which the former president wrote of Abubakar’s propensity to corruption, tendency to disloyalty, inability to stick to the truth, poor judgement, lack of transparency and readiness to sacrifice national interest for selfish interest.
The council called on Abubakar to withdraw from the presidential race, describing the 500000 dollar payment as only the beginning of what it said would be further revelations. It also told the people of Taraba State that the ADC candidate was among those responsible for the failure to start what would have been Nigeria’s largest hydropower project and the economic benefits that would have followed for the state.
The Mambilla scheme remains unbuilt more than two decades after the original contract dispute began.
By John James
