President-elect Bola Tinubu’s son Seyi has been alleged to have bought a London mansion previously owned by Kolawole Aluko whom the Nigerian government was investigating for fraud.
Seyi reportedly bought the house in 2017 for $10.8m through his firm, Bloomberg reports.
The report, citing previously unreported UK company documents, said the property, acquired by Seyi’s firm was part of the biggest corruption scandals the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari was seeking to probe.
The foreign news medium said the documents show that Seyi, 37, is “the main shareholder of Aranda Overseas Corp., an offshore company that paid £9million ($10.8 million) to Deutsche Bank for the property in north London in late 2017.”
“The private three-floor residence in St. John’s Wood — a district favored by American bankers — is equipped with an eight-car driveway, two gardens, electric gates and a gym,” the report said.
It further said that at the time of the purchase, Nigerian government was seeking to arrest Aluko, the house’s former owner, accusing him of fleeing while owing the country an oil-trading debt worth more than $1.5 billion.
“The state was also attempting to confiscate the upscale real estate and other assets it suspected had been acquired by the businessman, Kolawole Aluko, with the profits of crime,” the report said.
It also said the documents did not suggest Tinubu was personally involved in the acquisition of the UK property in 2017, noting that Buhari visited him there in August 2021.
Bloomberg said Tinubu’s spokesman and Seyi did not respond to emails, phone calls and text messages seeking comment. It also said a British lawyer listed as Aranda’s agent in the UK declined to comment citing confidentiality rules.
The report noted that Buhari’s administration initiated legal cases against former minister of petroleum, Diezani Alison-Madueke and two businessmen — Aluko and Olajide Omokore — who won lucrative contracts during her tenure.
The US government said in a 2017 forfeiture lawsuit filed in Texas that the pair bribed the minister by funding her “lavish” lifestyle and failed to pay the state energy company for most of the crude they received.
The report further stated, “Alison-Madueke, who is based in London, has denied the allegations. She is challenging multiple forfeiture orders issued by Nigerian courts and has accused the anti-corruption agency of blocking her efforts to defend herself in criminal proceedings.
“In June 2016, a federal judge in the capital, Abuja, granted a request by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to seize more than a dozen properties that Aluko had acquired in Nigeria and abroad, including the one in St. John’s Wood. That forfeiture order was still in force when Tinubu’s son bought the house out of receivership 16 months later.
The ruling was made on an interim basis pending the conclusion of an investigation into Aluko that was still ongoing as of at least the end of 2018, according to court filings. Aluko can’t comment on the forfeiture case because it is still “sub-judice,” his lawyer Tokunbo Jaiye-Agoro said by email.”
