Michael Kaase Aondoakaa

Attorney General, Minister of Justice (since 2007)

Date of Birth: 12/06/1962
Place of Birth: Benue

Education: Maiduguri University, 1985

Career: Junior Partner, J.Tine Tur and Co Chambers, Gvoko, 1987-89; Principal Partner, M.K. Aondoakaa and Co, Makurdi; Attorney General and Minister of Justice, 2007 to date 

Commentary: The second most remarkable detail about Michael Aondoakaa's time as Attorney General is that most efforts to prosecute Nigerians for corruption have come from jurisdictions abroad. The first is that he has tried to thwart them all. In August 2007, he wrote to a British court asking that Delta State ex-Governor James Ibori not be prosecuted for money laundering (the letter was used to unfreeze Ibori's accounts). In September 2007, he asked a French judge not to charge former Oil Minister Dan Etete with corruption. He denied a June 2009 Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty request from Britain regarding the investigation of three former governors (Ibori, Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Obong Victor Attah). They are suspected of a US$38 million fraud but Aondoakaa refused.

Aondoakaa was born in Benue on 12 June 1962 and graduated from the Maiduguri University in law in 1985. He was called to the Bar in 1986. In 1993 he opened his own firm, M. K. Aondoakaa and Company. He was recruited (at Ibori's instigation) in 2007 as President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua's Attorney General.

Since then, controversy has dogged Aondoakaa. He was behind the sacking of Nuhu Ribadu, the effective former head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. He gutted the Uwais electoral reform white paper, removing the crucial point that the head of the Independent Electoral Commission be independent and not picked by the President. And he has refused to release funds for a task force panel set up to investigate the Nigerian end of a $190 mn. bribery scandal involving United States oil services giant Halliburton.

July's deadly, militant attack on an Atlas Cove oil depot occurred after Yar'Adua had ordered Aondoakaa to release Henry Okah, a leader in the militant group. Aondoakaa left for São Tomé e Príncipe without releasing Okah. Suspecting a ruse, the militants attacked the depot, killing nine navy personnel and civilians. Aondoakaa hurried back and ordered the release.