London estate agent linked to oil minister in Nigerian bribery probe
A London estate agent who appeared on the BBC’s Homes Under The Hammer has been named in an investigation into alleged corruption by a former Nigerian oil minister known as ‘The Madam’.
Court documents filed in the US alleged King’s Cross estate agency Daniel Ford helped to buy millions of pounds worth of properties for Diezani Alison-Madueke in London.
Daniel Ford’s sole director is Adeyemi Edun, UK company records show.
The Nigerian government is trying to recover billions of pounds it believes were looted from the country during the presidency of Goodluck Jonathan between 2010 and 2015. As part of these efforts, civil asset recovery proceedings have been separately filed in the UK, US and Nigerian courts.
Two of the properties were frozen by the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service last year.
A separate court application filed by Nigerian investigators in Abuja in August this year claims ‘one Adeyemi Edun’ received more than $5.5million in cash from Alison-Madueke to be used to buy properties for her in Lagos in May 2011.
Edun said: “Daniel Ford and I have always conducted [our] estate agency work honestly, within the law and the relevant regulations, and that there have been no recorded incidents of [us] engaging in any corrupt activity”.
Read our Mail on Sunday story here:
And our Premium Times (Nigeria) story here:
Nigerian who helped Alison-Madueke buy properties in London revealed
After our story was published, Nigerian anti-corruption investigators arrested the estate agent the next time he touched down in Nigeria. He was questioned and later released.
“TV property expert held in Nigeria after our probe”
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-5186485/TV-property-expert-held-Nigeria-probe.html
[Mail on Sunday (UK), 16 December 2017]
“Estate agent who helped Diezani Alison-Madueke buy properties in UK arrested”
[Premium Times (Nigeria), 17 December 2017]