UK supreme court dismisses P&ID appeal, affirms Nigeria’s £43m award

The supreme court in the United Kingdom (UK) has dismissed the appeal filed by Process & Industrial Development (P&ID) that the £43m award in favour of Nigeria should be paid in Nigerian currency and not pound sterling.

In a unanimous decision delivered by a five-member panel on Wednesday, the UK supreme court held that P&ID should pay the £43m award in pound, the currency used by Nigeria to pay its lawyers in the case.

The justices in the panel are Robert Reed, Dame Simler, David Richards, Ben Stephens, and Patrick Hodge.

BACKGROUND

P&ID had entered into a deal in 2010 to build a gas processing plant in Calabar, Cross River state, but the company said the agreement collapsed because the Nigerian government did not fulfil its end of the bargain.

The Nigerian government alleged that the gas deal was a scam conceived to defraud the country.

But P&ID denied the allegation and accused the Nigerian government of “false allegations and wild conspiracy theories”.

Consequently, P&ID took legal recourse and secured an arbitral award against the country.

On January 31, 2017, a tribunal ruled that Nigeria should pay P&ID $6.6 billion as damages, as well as pre and post-judgment interest at seven percent, which later amounted to $11 billion.

In October 2023, Robin Knowles, justice of the commercial courts of England and Wales, haltedthe enforcement of the award by upholding Nigeria’s prayer that it was obtained by fraud and in violation of section 68 of the English Arbitration Act 1996.

The judge found that P&ID paid bribes to Nigerian officials involved in the drafting of the gas supply and processing agreement (GSPA) in 2010.

He also found that P&ID was illegally in possession of Nigeria’s privileged legal documents during the arbitration hearings.

The judge ordered that the company pay £43 million in compensation to Nigeria as legal fees and disbursements.

Displeased with the judgment, P&ID approached the UK court of appeal.

One of the issues raised in the P&ID appeal bordered on whether the lower court was wrong to order the £43 million legal cost to be paid in British pound sterling and not in naira.

The company argued that Nigeria funded its legal services by exchanging naira from its consolidated revenue fund.

In July 2024, the UK court of appeal dismissedthe appeal of P&ID and held that since Nigeria paid the legal costs in pound sterling, the cost order should be paid in the same currency.

THE JUDGEMENT 

Delivering the judgment, the UK supreme court held that there are no reasons for the award costs to be awarded in any other currency aside from sterling since English solicitors charged in that currency and the disbursements were made by Nigeria in sterling.

The supreme court panel refused to investigate how Nigeria funded the legal costs after P&ID argued that Nigeria converted naira to sterling to meet the financial obligations to its English solicitors.

The supreme court rejected the argument of P&ID that if the award sum is paid in sterling, Nigeria “would gain a substantial windfall at its expense because the sterling sums which Nigeria paid to its solicitors were the equivalent of approximately 25 billion naira when they were paid whereas they are now the equivalent of 95 billion naira”.

The panel held that depreciation of naira has “resulted in a substantial diminution of the domestic purchasing power of the naira in Nigeria since 2019 and especially since 2023”.

“For all these reasons, which are essentially the same as those given by the Court of Appeal, we conclude that Knowles did not err in law in the exercise of his discretion,” the supreme court said.

“We add as a postscript that, contrary to P&ID’s submission, Nigeria does not enjoy a large windfall from this decision. The depreciation of its currency internationally has resulted in a substantial diminution of the domestic purchasing power of the naira in Nigeria since 2019 and especially since 2023.

“Since the hearing, the court has received submissions from the parties on costs. We would dismiss the appeal and award Nigeria their costs on the standard basis.”

The judgment of the UK supreme court can be downloaded here.

(the cable)