The legal dispute, which has dragged for more than a decade, centres on a contract that Federal Government officials struck with Michael Quinn, an Irish former band manager, and his business partner Brendan Cahill, to help the country turn its vast reserves of natural gas into power.
Quinn and Cahill’s offshore company, Process & Industrial Development, in 2012, began arbitration proceedings against Nigeria for breach of contract. P&ID ultimately won a $6.6bn award from a panel of arbitrators in London, one of the biggest known payouts to a company from a sovereign state.
That bill has risen to $11bn with interest more than Nigeria’s most recent budget for health, education and justice ministries combined.
