We obeyed law on OPL 245 – Eni

Eni, a global oil giant, with operations in Nigeria, on Monday said it complied with the law on issues pertaining to Oil Prospecting License 245.

It said in a statement issued by Eni’s subsidiary, Nigerian Agip Oil Company, the international oil firm stated it had published on its website the documents of the judicial investigation into the acquisition of OPL245 in Nigeria.

The IOC said it carried out an in-depth fact-checking on all the main points of the ongoing trial at the Milan Tribunal.

The oil firm said it had decided this transparency initiative in the belief that the reading of the documents would allow people to verify directly how Eni acted with absolute correctness and in full compliance with the law.

It noted that through this initiative, Eni outlined with broad documentary support, the key points of an affair in which international institutional bodies such as the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission had recently closed their investigations without taking any action against the company. “An operation against which accurate internal investigations carried out on several occasions by independent third parties had in the past confirmed the correctness of the operation,” it said.

The firm said the development of OPL245 would have brought and would bring great economic and social benefits to the Nigerian people.

It said, “Eni was not required to know, nor knew, the destination of the funds paid to the Malabu company by the Nigerian government, a payment authorised by the British anti-money laundering authorities.”

The statement said that the allegations of bribes to Eni managers were denied by witnesses and experts in the courtroom as well as by the Finance Guard itself in 2016.

It stated that as part of the transaction, Eni complied with internal procedures, international best practices and implemented any industrial, economic and process verification.