Nigerian activist and former presidential candidate Omoyele Sowore has publicly challenged World Trade Organisation (WTO) Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala to provide evidence for her claim that her mother’s kidnapping was linked to an alleged $2.4 billion oil subsidy fraud she uncovered as Nigeria’s Finance Minister.
In a post on X, Sowore said Okonjo-Iweala “has repeatedly claimed” that her mother was abducted in retaliation for exposing the alleged fraud, but argued that “serious questions remain unanswered.”
Sowore asked who Okonjo-Iweala identified as responsible for the alleged fraud during her two terms in office, which he described as a period in which she “failed spectacularly.” He also asked which companies and individuals were implicated, and demanded to know: “Where are the audit findings, investigation reports and records of prosecution?”
He pointed to her book, Fighting Corruption Is Dangerous, which presents the 2012 kidnapping as retaliation for her anti-corruption work. According to Sowore, the book “provided no evidence of who committed the alleged fraud and what happened to the money.” He added that she used the book to attack critics, including himself and others who had questioned her economic policies and record.
Sowore said there is “documented” evidence from the Nigeria Police Force that palace guards in her father’s palace, relatives and domestic workers were involved in the abduction. He said these allegations have been the subject of police investigations, prosecution records and judicial findings.
Acknowledging that he is often critical of the police, Sowore said that, to his knowledge, Okonjo-Iweala “has neither publicly challenged the police’s official account” of the kidnapping nor demanded a fresh, independent investigation.
Sowore also criticised Bloomberg TV’s Francine Lacqua, saying she “ought to have done due diligence” before accepting Okonjo-Iweala’s account without scrutiny.
He closed with a series of questions: who stole the alleged $2.4 billion, where the audit findings are, which companies and individuals were implicated, and what became of any investigations. “Most importantly,” he asked, “what verifiable evidence establishes a direct connection between the alleged oil subsidy fraud and her mother’s kidnapping?”
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