Former NNPC GM Paulinus Okoronkwo has been convicted in US over $2.1 million bribe.

NaijaOnPoint Nigeria reports that United States court has found Paulinus Okoronkwo, a Nigerian-American and former general manager of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), guilty of receiving a $2.1 million bribe.

Okoronkwo was convicted on charges of transactional money laundering, tax evasion, and obstruction of justice.

Prosecutors revealed that while serving as NNPC’s upstream division GM, Okoronkwo accepted the $2.1 million from Addax Petroleum, a Switzerland-based subsidiary of China’s state-owned Sinopec. The payment, wired in October 2015 to his Los Angeles law firm’s trust account, was disguised as consultancy fees but intended to secure favorable drilling rights in Nigeria.

During a four-day trial last month, evidence showed that Addax executives falsified records, dismissed staff who raised concerns, and misled auditors to cover up the bribe.

Okoronkwo allegedly used nearly $1 million of the bribe to make a down payment on a house in Valencia, California, while failing to declare the income on his 2015 federal tax return.

“The engagement letter that Addax signed with Okoronkwo’s law office — listing a fake Lagos address — was a ruse to conceal the payment as a bribe for securing favorable financial terms for crude oil drilling in Nigeria,” the US Attorney’s Office, Central District of California, said in a statement.

The statement added that Okoronkwo obstructed justice in June 2022 by lying to federal investigators, claiming the money was client funds rather than personal income.

US District Judge John Walter has scheduled December 1 for the sentencing hearing. If convicted on all counts, Okoronkwo could face: