President Goodluck Jonathan’s special adviser on political matters, Ahmed Gulak, leads a growing list of Nigerian business and political elites who ran or still run secret offshore companies and accounts where they either hide their wealth to evade taxes, launder money or commit fraud, according to a cache of documents reviewed by PREMIUM TIMES and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, ICIJ.
Mr. Gulak, who deals in the supply of fast boats, radial systems and naval communication equipment as well as military hardware to the Nigerian government, was linked to a secret shell company in the British Virgin Islands, one of the world’s most notorious tax havens.
Mr. Gulak is listed along with a former petroleum minister, Edmund Daukouru, and a former head of the Nigeria Ports Authority, Bello Gwandu, as key Nigerians indulging in this practice, according to our investigations.
Ahmed Gulak, the special adviser to Mr. Jonathan on political matters, is listed by company website as legal adviser to Erojim Group of Companies, a contracting firm that claims to supply fast boats, radial systems and naval communication equipment and other military hardware to the Nigerian government in liaison with its foreign partner, Poly Technologies, and NORINCO, both of China.
On the other hand, Edmund Daukouru, a former petroleum minister sits on the board of Caverton Offshore Support Group, a Lagos-based provider of integrated offshore support services in Nigeria but which has also bounded with some foreigners to form a secret company abroad. Also on Caverton’s nine-man board is Bello Gwandu, a ruling party politician and former managing director of the Nigeria Ports Authority, a federal agency that oversees and operates the ports of the world’s most populous black nation.
Mr. Gulak, a lawyer and former lawmaker in Nigeria’s Northwest state of Adamawa, is one of President Jonathan’s closest aides, having worked as director of mobilization in the campaign that returned the president to power in 2011. As legal adviser and close associate of Jimmy Ntuen, Erojim’s CEO, Mr. Gulak helped draft the legal papers for the incorporation of Erojim and its subsidiaries, including assisting Mr. Ntuen, who suddenly became Jimmy Ernest, when the British Virgin Island’s version of Erojim was being incorporated.
These individuals are among a number of Nigerian officials and businesspersons who have links with shell companies abroad. It is not clear why they incorporated these shell companies – that is corporations that exist but do not have employees or assets and carry out no visible operations. But Shell companies, according to Fraud Auditing Inc., a worldwide authority on fraud, have become progressively known for their involvement with illegal activities, including money laundering, tax evasion, billing schemes and fictitious service schemes.
JD:I dont know what to say about this now!Read it and draw your own conclusions
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