Transparency International accuses Saraki of buying two London properties worth £15m with proceeds of corruption

ANTI-corruption watchdog Transparency International has accused senate president Bukola Saraki of acquiring two properties in central London worth a combined total of about £15m with proceeds of corruption.

 

According to Transparency International, a report into the two properties was conducted under the auspices of Unexplained Wealth Orders (Uwo), a new investigative power designed to help law enforcement agencies act on corrupt assets. These properties are located at numbers seven and eight Whittaker Street, Belgravia, London.

 

Transparency International said the houses at the two addresses are owned by Landfield International Developments and Renocon Property Development. According to the report, the companies are managed by Toyin Saraki, the wife of the senate president and one of his personal aides.

 

A Uwo spokesperson said: “The report is particularly useful where there is no realistic prospect of cooperation or conviction in the country of origin but there are sufficient grounds for suspicion that an asset has been acquired with the proceeds of corruption."

 

Other people indicted in the report include Igor Shuvalov, Russia's first deputy prime minister; Ahmed Mahmoud Azwai, a former Libyan major general; Nawaz Sharif, the former prime minister of Pakistan and the first family of Azerbaijan. In 2015, the Panama Papers exposed Senator Saraki’s ownership of at least three secret offshore firms, which he allegedly used in concealing assets abroad.

 

Also, in November 2017, Senator Saraki was named among over 120 politicians and leaders in nearly 50 countries who have reportedly been utilising shell companies in tax havens to conceal assets, evade tax or launder funds. Senator Saraki is currently facing charges of the false declaration of assets in Nigeria.

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