JUST IN: FINAL VICTORY FOR NIGERIA AS LONDON COURT THROWS OUT P&ID'S PLEA TO APPEAL $11BILLION JUDGEMENT

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Process & Industrial Development (P&ID) attempted to appeal the decision that stopped the enforcement of its $11 billion award against Nigeria, but a London court denied their motion.

The presiding judge, Robin Knowles, declared on Thursday that the award against Nigeria ought to be immediately overturned.

By sustaining Nigeria’s claim that the award was obtained by deception and in contravention of Section 68 of the English Arbitration Act 1996, Knowles stopped the enforcement of the award on October 23.

The Nigerian authorities engaged in the development of the 2010 gas supply and processing agreement (GSPA) received bribes from P&ID, the judge found.

Additionally, he discovered that P&ID had unlawfully obtained Nigeria’s confidential legal documents during the arbitration proceedings.

Knowles added that even after making his decision, he was still faced with a choice between three possibilities.

The options included ” (a) to remit the award to the tribunal, in whole or in part, for reconsideration, (b) to set the award aside in whole or in part, or (c) to declare the award to be of no effect, in whole or in part”.

Nigeria had claimed, under the common law precept that “fraud unravels all,” that the award ought to be annulled in its entirety.

However, Knowles stated in his statement on December 8 that he had made the decision not to return the award to the arbitration panel. He completely dominated the award.

P&ID did, however, request authorization to challenge the October 2023 ruling.

Its attorneys contended that the judge disregarded a “causality” criterion, which would have demonstrated whether the arbitration award would still have been rendered in the event that P&ID had not given bribes to public authorities.

Furthermore, they maintained that P&ID’s success in the arbitration was unrelated to the protected documents that were discovered to be in its possession.

However, the judge denied P&ID’s request to appeal the ruling on Thursday.

Since the firm is unable to get approval from the court of appeals, this practically ends the matter.