A federal court in the United States has ordered Abuja-based politician Dumebi Kachikwu to pay $2.1 million over a tax fraud case, Peoples Gazette reports.
Kachikwu was ordered to pay $2.1 million by Judge George Jarrod Hazel of the U.S. District Court.
The January 2023 judgement was the final decision on the tax liability case brought by American authorities against Kachikwu and his wife, Somachi, who was also ordered to pay parts of a separate $56,000 debt to the U.S. treasury.
According to the report by The Gazette, Kachikwu had earlier had his assets in the U.S. confiscated as the case was underway in 2022.
Details of the judgement came to light as Kachikwu returned to public infamy with a campaign to claim ownership of the newly formed political coalition against President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Opposition leaders recently adopted the African Democratic Congress to mount a robust challenge to Mr Tinubu, whose reign has been tainted by endemic corruption, abuse of power, and a sudden security collapse.
It would be recalled that no sooner had the alliance been announced, Kachikwu launched a disinformation campaign, using incurious media outlets to spread unfounded claims that he owned the ADC infrastructure.
But The Gazette’s findings showed Kachikwu was not even a member of the ADC’s national executive panel.
His closest association to the party, according to the report, came in the run-up to the 2023 elections, when he used his ill-acquired resources to upstage Kingsley Moghalu as the party’s candidate.
Kachikwu was accused at the time of hijacking the ADC to undermine the party from within as an agent of Mr Tinubu, who was running on the ruling All Progressives Congress’ platform at the time.
Although Kachikwu denied the allegations, but his public statements since the election have largely clarified his loyalty to Tinubu.
Kachikwu is a familiar guest on Lagos-based TVC, a broadcast network which President Tinubu runs with stolen Lagos funds.
On Wednesday, he appeared on various political magazine programmes to castigate the opposition coalition as corrupt, geriatric and politically compromised.
“Dumebi Kachikwu is an agent of the president,” a senior ruling party official told The Gazette on Wednesday. “We’re happy to have him.”
Kachikwu first made headlines in the mid-aughts when he was named as the facilitator of an international bribery scheme that led to the jailing of former U.S. lawmaker William Jefferson.
The nefarious iGate-NDTV broadband deal impugned Nigeria’s reputation, anti-corruption officials said at the time.
It was unclear when he returned to Nigeria, settling in Abuja, where he cast a general reputation as a notorious wheeler-dealer.
His brother, Ibe Kachikwu, publisher of fiendish magazines, served as the petroleum minister (state) under President Muhammadu Buhari.
Kachikwu, who runs multimedia platform Roots TV, told The Gazette about his regular visits to the U.S., which he said were often posted on social media.
But no such posts were found on his Instagram and Twitter pages.
He, however, sidestepped questions about his association with Tinubu and the $2.1 million judgment outstanding against him in the U.S.
A presidential spokesman declined to comment on whether Kachikwu had any ties to the administration. The president has long been known to plant agents in opposition parties.
In 2023, he used Nyesom Wike to sabotage the Peoples Democratic Party by plunging the party into perennial crises.
Wike was subsequently rewarded with a ministerial position, which he has mindlessly exploited to loot public assets for his family.
A spokesman for the PDP section of the coalition said the new alliance would be focusing on ousting the APC from power in 2027, rather than the ruling party’s antics.
