April 7 2016
In Nigeria, the Panama Papers leak could be about to claim its latest high-profile victim.
Bukola Saraki, the president of the Nigerian Senate, has been caught up in the scandal relating to the leak of 11.5 million tax documents from Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.
Saraki—who is currently on trial in Nigeria on charges of fraud, including false declaration of assets, all of which he denies—is accused of failing to declare at least four offshore assets listed under his wife Toyin’s name. The assets include a property in London’s plush Belgravia neighborhood, as well as two companies registered in the British Virgin Islands and a third in the Seychelles, both known tax havens, according to Nigeria’s Premium Times, a media partner in the Panama Papers investigation.
Following the Panama Papers leak, Nigerian civil society groups have called upon President Buhari—who has made tackling corruption a key prong of his administration—to launch a probe into Saraki and other top officials implicated by the leak. Such a probe could raise further difficult questions for Saraki and is the last thing the embattled Senate president needs.