Black Looks

The bribery allegations against Halliburton’s actions in Nigeria during the Sani Abacha dicatorship have been widened to cover the past 20 years and will include investigating Halliburton’s (and presumably Dick Cheney’s – see video Cheney exposed) relationship with Shell and possibly other oil multinationals operating in Nigeria.

Criminal investigations of former Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root (KBR), for alleged bribery in the construction of Nigeria’s $10 billion liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plant on Bonny Island, have been widened to cover the past 20 years of Halliburton’s operations in Nigeria. Investigators will also probe accusations of embezzlement by senior executives, and Halliburton’s relations with other multinationals, including Royal Dutch Shell.

Halliburton recently dismissed two of its most senior executives, Robert Stanley and William Chaudin, on suspicion of embezzling $5 million from a Nigerian energy project.

The initial claim, which started the investigation some six years ago, was that Halliburton and others working on a gas export project conspired to win a $5 billion construction contract in 1995 by establishing a $180 million slush-fund to bribe Nigerian officials, and to reward Western contractors between 1994 and 2002, which includes the period when US Vice-President Dick Cheney was Halliburton’s chairman and CEO (1995-2000). Such payments are illegal under a 1997 convention barring bribery of foreign public officials in commercial negotiations, adopted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

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Nigeria
Niger Delta
Halliburton