A United Kingdom court has acquitted Nigeria’s former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Alison-Madueke, of all six counts of bribery following a five-month trial at Southwark Crown Court in London.
The case, brought by the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA), alleged that Alison-Madueke received financial and other benefits from oil sector actors between 2011 and 2015 in exchange for facilitating lucrative contracts involving Nigeria’s state-owned oil company. The prosecution had also accused her of living a lavish lifestyle allegedly funded through illicit advantages, including private travel and luxury accommodations.
However, after reviewing the evidence, the jury returned a not-guilty verdict on all charges, effectively clearing the former minister of wrongdoing. Her legal team maintained throughout the trial that she neither solicited nor accepted bribes, arguing further that critical records supporting her defence were unavailable due to the long delay in prosecution and restrictions on accessing documents.
Alison-Madueke, who previously served as the first female president of OPEC between 2014 and 2015, has faced multiple legal and corruption-related investigations across different jurisdictions over the past decade. She has consistently denied all allegations.
The verdict marks the end of a long-running legal battle that began with her arrest in 2015.
