Ex-Nigerian governor gets £1 in damages for unlawful detention in UK

Former Nigerian governor and ex-convict James Ibori has been awarded £1 in damages for unlawful detention by British Home Secretary in December last year.

This is way below the £4,000 he is demanding from the court for being unlawfully held for a day and 18 hours on December 20, 2016 in immigration detention although due for release.

A London High Court on Monday contended to Ibori’s claim but said his immigration detention was probably because of millions of pounds the authorities have still not recovered from him, BBC reported.

His lawyer, Tony Eluemunor, had announced earlier on Monday the “winning streak” of Ibori, describing it as an “important legal victory against the British Secretary of State for the Home Department. The costs the Home Department will have to pay to him, as ordered by the court, will be determined later.”

James Ibori has been jailed in the UK since 2012 for fraud of nearly £50 million. He was arrested in Dubai and extradited to the UK after failure to arrest him in Nigeria.

He was previously convicted in 1991 for stealing in a store in the UK before becoming governor of the Delta State in 1991.

Despite spending about five years in jail in the UK, he was gloriously welcomed to Nigeria in February this year when he returned home.