Mambilla Power Project: Tinubu Did Not Ask Me To Testify Against Agunloye In Paris – Obasanjo

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has stated that he decided to testify at the Mambilla Power Project arbitration holding in France because he found the claims of former Minister of Power, Olu Agunloye atrocious and needed to set the record straight.

Obasanjo noted that contrary to speculation President Bola Tinubu did not ask him to testify in the case.

Naijaonpoint reports that Obasanjo testified in the ongoing arbitration on Wednesday. Before that, ex-President Muhammadu Buhari had equally testified.

Speaking with Premium Times in Paris, Obasanjo said, “I volunteered myself to testify in this case. Nobody sent me to do so. President Tinubu did not ask me to do so as speculated. I didn’t speak to anybody on my intention to testify.

“I decided to testify because of the statement made on the matter by Olu Agunloye. I considered his claims atrocious and thought it necessary to set the records straight.”

Sunrise Power, which claimed to have been awarded a $6 billion contract to build, operate and transfer the power plant by the Obasanjo administration in May 2003, is in arbitration with Nigeria at the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris.

The company has alleged a breach of contract by the Nigerian Government and is seeking monetary compensation of $2.3 billion to cover what it had spent on financial and legal consultants. Agunloye was the minister of power under whom the contract was awarded.

Earlier, Obasanjo had blamed the former minister for mismanaging the project between 1999 and 2003.

In 2023, while responding to Obasanjo’s allegation, which he said was “baseless, false and malicious,” Agunloye noted that the investment Sunrise Power needed to execute the project to the completion stage was valued at a maximum of $6 billion by four ministers of power and Obasanjo before he himself became minister of power.

The Nigerian Government has claimed that fraud was involved in awarding the contract and that some public officials were also corrupted in the process.