An English court has rejected an appeal by Process and Industrial Development (P&ID), a company owned by two Cayman Island-based entities, to dismiss an earlier ruling regarding the currency in which the payment of Nigeria’s legal costs in a lawsuit involving the firm would be made.
On Friday, Julian Flaux, a justice of the High Court of Justice of England and Wales, along with two other judges, decided to reject P&ID’s appeal. This appeal followed a judgment from December that set aside an $11 billion damages award to P&ID in a breach of contract dispute.
P&ID argued that the judge’s order for the company to pay Nigeria £43 million in legal fees and disbursements, made seven months ago, should have been specified in naira, considering the source of Nigeria’s consolidated revenue fund is denominated in the local currency.
Last year, Nigeria secured a significant breakthrough after over a decade of legal battles with P&ID. The company, established by two Irish citizens and registered in the British Virgin Islands, had sued Nigeria over a failed deal to construct a gas plant. In 2017, the London Court of International Arbitration awarded $6.6 billion to P&ID, citing Nigeria’s failure to fulfill its contractual obligations. With interest, this sum ballooned to $11 billion, posing a substantial risk to Nigeria’s foreign exchange reserves if the December verdict had been unfavorable.
Nigeria’s legal team successfully overturned the arbitration award by proving that the contract was tainted by bribery. They argued that P&ID intended to exploit litigation for financial gain. Evidence presented showed that the contract was a product of corruption, with P&ID allegedly bribing officials of Nigeria’s petroleum ministry to secure the deal in 2010. Additionally, P&ID was accused of bribing Nigerian lawyers to obtain confidential documents during the legal proceedings.
P&ID, founded by Irishmen Michael Quinn and Brendan Cahill, had been pursuing the claim since 2012. Robin Knowles, the judge who overturned the award to P&ID, emphasized that the company and its lawyers were “driven by greed and prepared to use corruption,” without considering the harm their actions would cause.
P&ID contended that despite Nigeria paying its lawyers £43 million in pounds sterling, the reimbursement should be made in naira. The company argued that the payment in naira at the time would have cost Nigeria around 23 billion naira, but paying £43 million now would equate to about 76 billion naira due to exchange rate fluctuations. Allowing P&ID to refund the money in naira would essentially reduce the payment to less than £43 million.
However, Justice Flaux upheld the original ruling, stating, “In my judgment, therefore, the Judge was right to accept Nigeria’s straightforward submission that because Nigeria had been invoiced and had incurred its liability to its solicitors in sterling, and had paid those bills in sterling, the court ought to make its Costs Order in sterling.”
