By Jemine Razaak
In a day and age where the court of public opinion seems more relevant than the law courts and where people are condemned “guilty before proven innocent”, all it takes to destroy a person’s image is to put out a story through several media outlets smearing their character as corrupt and labelling them as fraudulent.
This is particularly dangerous for anyone who falls victim of this because we already live in a country where there’s great distrust for our institutions due to the staggering level of corruption. This means that the average reader is willing to believe that whoever is accused of whatever must be automatically guilty, because afterall “there’s corruption everywhere in Nigeria”.
This is the sad case of Mr. Amaechi Ndili who was recently smeared in the news by tying his name to a $4.6m fraud that never happened. Mr. Ndili who is the CEO of Lionstone Offshore Services which is being dragged to court defamed.
A report had claimed that in 2012, Ndili and Lionstone converted to personal use $4.6m meant for another company called Hercules Offshore Nigeria Ltd. This sum was from a contract Awarded by Addax Petroleum Development Nigeria Ltd. However, like typical one-sided propaganda aimed at leading readers to an intended conclusion, the report failed the objectivity test.
Digging deep into the issue, it becomes clear why the story took this direction. In all actuality, there had been a 7-year dispute between Lionstone Offshore Services and Hercules Offshore – a Houston based company, who by the way went into Liquidation and Bankruptcy in 2016. This dispute was over a contract awarded by Addax Petroleum Development Nigeria Ltd.
Lionstone and Hercules in 2012 entered into a Joint Bidding Agreement, pursuant to which Lionstone would bid on work in the Nigerian oil services sector and both parties would collaborate on the execution. Both parties in the Joint Bidding Agreement acknowledge that they are not parties and any disputes arising would be the subject of arbitration in London.
Prior to the tender however, Addax solely awarded Lionstone an interim contract with reference number TB2916. Hercules was neither a party to this contract, nor where they mentioned in this contract. They actually where not even qualified to work on this contract under extant local content laws of Nigeria. This contract TB2916 was signed between Lionstone and Addax in October, a full one month before the Tenders were due on contract TB2813. (That was eventually lost).
This notwithstanding, Hercules proceeded to Arbitration in London, and through a series of convoluted lies won an award against Lionstone Offshore services in 2016 and came to Nigeria and took leave to enforce this award in the Federal High Courts of Nigeria in Suit number FHC/L/CS/1461/2017. Lionstone successfully challenged this Suit, and the matter ended up in appeal court as suit number CA/LAG/CV/344/2019 The matter remains to be adjudicated on.
Hercules, in a desperate bid hired a lawyer who proceeded through a series of connections to involve the police in what is essentially a civil dispute between parties. This they did in a bid to recover what they believe is a debt. In response Lionstone Offshore sued the police and Hercules for interference in what is a purely civil dispute between parties, which is still in the courts and yet to be adjudicated on. The Lionstone Suit against Hercules and the Police is referenced in the Lagos State High Court as suit number: LD/3663CMW/18.
In 2020 the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP) of the Federation in a bid to intervene called for the files from the police prosecutors and showed up in court to take over the matter, as per the Constitution. The police however resisted this by refusing to hand over the files.
In response Lionstone, its CEO and family suddenly find themselves facing malicious persecution and allegations of theft over money duly paid to the contracted party – Lionstone, by Addax. This harassment from a non-existent entity, is spearheaded by a self-interested parties who only seek their own gain.
The battle therefore continues as we ask: who really is bent on maliciously persecuting Amaechi Ndili and tarnishing his image and reputation?
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