Business

Nigeria files fraud claims in bid to overturn $9bn P&ID award

Irish-founded company seeking to enforce award for failed gas project

One of the only ways to overturn the award now worth more than $9 billion is to prove fraud or corruption in the foundation of the contract, legal experts said. Photograph: iStock

Fri Dec 6 2019 - 16:17

Lawyers for the Nigerian government on Friday filed “new and substantive” allegations of fraud with a British court in its ongoing fight against an arbitration award now worth more than $9 billion (€8.1 billion), a spokesman for the attorney general said.

The government has been fighting efforts by the Irish-founded company Process & Industrial Developments (P&ID) to enforce the award for a failed gas project, and now is also seeking to overturn the underlying award, the spokesman said.

As the window to appeal the arbitration award expired, one of the only ways to overturn the award itself is to prove fraud or corruption in the foundation of the contract, legal experts said.

“Nigeria’s new filings with the English court is an act of desperation to try to undo the court’s sound conclusion that P&ID’s $10 billion award is enforceable,” British Virgin Islands-based P&ID said, adding that the award is now worth $10 billion due to interest accrued.

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P&ID, which was set up solely to build a gas-processing plant in Nigeria, won a $6.6 billion arbitration award after the 2010 deal collapsed. The award has been accruing interest since 2013.

P&ID was founded by Irish investors Michael Quinn, a Dublin businessman who used to manage Twink and Dickie Rock; and Brendan Cahill, a Dublin business consultant. Mr Quinn died in 2015. P&ID denies any wrongdoing. – Reuters

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