Judge David Tomlinson of Southwark Crown Court in London yesterday ordered that the sum of £101.5 million pounds (about $130 million) be confiscated from former Delta State governor, James Ibori.
The judge said Ibori should pay the sum amounting to N101,143,847,363.27 immediately or face an eight-year jail sentence.
In a Facebook post ahead of the judgment on Thursday, the former Delta State governor had revealed his plan to appeal against the confiscation order in the UK’s highest court.
Ibori had posted: “Finally, the shenanigans in the Southwark Crown Court are drawing to a close.
“Judge Tomlinson is due to make a confiscation order which should be both realisable and not punitive.
“However, after what transpired in court today, my hopes are rapidly fading for any degree of fairness.
“In the two years it has taken to write this judgment it seems apparent that he has forgotten many of the salient points and is prioritising expediency over justice.
“The next steps will be to take my fight for justice to the highest courts in the UK.”
In 2012, Ibori was convicted in London for fraud and money-laundering and sent to jail for 13 years.
After serving for about five years, Ibori returned to Nigeria in 2017.
He did not attend Thursday’s hearing, where lead prosecution counsel Jonathan Kinnear told the court that the total amount that should be confiscated from Ibori was £101.5 million.
He argued that if Ibori did not pay up, he should be sentenced to between five and 10 years in prison.
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