Dick Cheney Facing Charges in Nigeria Bribery Case

Added by David Sandercock on December 6, 2010

Nigeria’s anti-corruption police has announced it will file charges against former US vice-president Dick Cheney over a $180 million bribery case.

The announcement follows last year’s guilty plead by a former unit of the U.S. energy firm Haliburton, KBR; a Houston-based engineering firm, of U.S. charges of bribery, concerning some $180 million being paid to Nigerian officials between 1994 and 2004 in order of securing the $6 billion Bonny Island Liquefied Gas project (LNG) in the conflict-ridden Niger Delta.

The case was settled in the U.S. with KBR and Halliburton reaching a $579 million settlement. However, Nigeria, France and Switzerland have since undertaken their own investigations into the matter.

Femi Babafemi, speaking for Nigeria’s Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) said “We are filing charges against Cheney,” although he did not comment on what the charges were or where they will be filed.

Cheney headed Halliburton before being appointed George W Bush’s vice-president in 2001. In 2008, Albert “Jack” Stanley, former KBR chief executive officer and Cheney employee, pleaded guilty to charges of bribery.

However, a Halliburton statement read: “The Halliburton oil field services operations in Nigeria have never in any way been any part of the LNG project and none of the Halliburton employees have ever had any connection to or participation in that project.”

Analysts have noted that the revived interest in the Halliburton case could be a convenient trick by incumbent Goodluck Jonathan as he stands to challenge former vice-president Atiku Abubakar – in office between 1999 and 2007 – in the party nominations to the upcoming presidential elections. “This is just the work of political opponents who will stop at nothing in order to destroy your political career,” Abubakar said.