The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project has sued President Bola Tinubu, over “the failure to probe the allegations that USD$2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion public funds of oil revenues and budgeted as fuel subsidy payments are missing and unaccounted for between 2016 and 2019.”
SERAP filed a lawsuit against Tinubu at the Federal High Court in Lagos, seeking an order of mandamus to promptly investigate allegations that USD$2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion in public funds are missing and unaccounted for between 2016 and 2019.
Additionally, they are seeking an order of mandamus to compel President Tinubu to direct anti-corruption agencies to promptly investigate fuel subsidy payments made by governments since 1999, name and shame and prosecute suspected perpetrators and recover any proceeds of crimes.
SERAP is also seeking: “an order of mandamus to direct and compel President Tinubu to use any recovered proceeds of crime as palliatives to address the impact of the subsidy removal on poor Nigerians, and to put in place mechanisms for transparency and accountability in the oil sector.”
In the suit, SERAP argues that: “The allegations that US$2.1 billion and N3.1 trillion of public funds are missing and unaccounted amount to a fundamental breach of national anticorruption laws and the country’s international obligations including under the UN Convention against Corruption to which Nigeria is a state party.”
SERAP also stated that “The Tinubu government has constitutional and international legal obligations to get to the bottom of these allegations and ensure accountability for these serious crimes against the Nigerian people.”
According to them, “Directing and compelling President Tinubu to promptly probe, name and shame and bring to justice the perpetrators and to recover any missing public funds would advance the right of Nigerians to restitution, compensation, and guarantee of non-repetition.”
SERAP further noted that “Allegations of corruption in fuel subsidy payments suggest that the poor have rarely benefited from the use and management of the payments.”