Okoi Obono-Obla, former Chairman of the Special Investigation Panel (SPIP) for the Recovery of Public Property, has revealed that loot recovered during former President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration was returned to the looters.

In an interview on Saturday with Seun Okinbaloye on the Mic On Podcast, Obono-Obla discussed the pervasive corruption within Nigeria’s system. He claimed that his efforts to prosecute many looters were thwarted by the former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, along with other officials from the same administration.

SPIP was an independent investigative panel established by former President Buhari to recover Nigeria’s looted assets.

“Some of the things I recovered were returned to the looters. There was this case of someone from whom I recovered over 80 brand new X-class Mercedes Benz cars (armoured plated) from Jabi, Abuja,” he said. Obono-Obla recounted how he wrote to the Director General of Customs and the Federal Inland Revenue Services to check if customs duties and taxes had been paid on the vehicles, only to find out they had not.

“We obtained an order of interim forfeiture from the court pending the hearing of the case. I sent a memo to Malami to brief him on our actions, only for him to tell me that he never mandated me to do the investigations,” Obono-Obla stated.