Lagos — A former official of Kellog, Roots and Brown (KBR), Mr. Albert Stanley, has pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy in a federal court in Houston, Texas, the United States in connection with a decade-long scheme to bribe officials in Nigeria to influence the awarding of construction contracts for liquefaction facilities.

Mr. Stanley whose consortium bribed itself into winning a $6 billion contract is now to serve a seven year jail term and pay $10.8 million for violating the US foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

KBR was part of the TSKJ consortium alleged to have paid huge bribes to officials of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), NLNG and some political office holders whose positions were crucial in order to secure juicy contracts in the building of the initial trains of the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG).

A senior official of the NLNG told Daily Champion on telephone that the present management of the company could not comment on the scandal since it was not yet in place at the time of the bribery (1994-2004).

He explained that the contract in question was for the construction of the initial trains which had to be streamed before the present crop of workers could be engaged.

The bribery scandal had activated investigations on some of the companies that are quoted on the New York Stock Exchange and the London Stock Exchange respectively. Interestingly, despite the fact that names of the recipients of the bribes were mentioned, government whose funds were diverted had played down on the bribery case, allowing the matter to die naturally in the Nigerian context.

However, the US authorities had followed the case which is said to violate their Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

Albert Stanley pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and promised to cooperate with prosecutors in the hopes that prosecutors would recommend he receive a lighter sentence.

He is scheduled to be sentenced November 20.

In a statement, Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich of the US Justice Department's criminal division said Stanley was responsible for securing engineering, procurement and construction contracts to build LNG facilities on Bonny Island, valued at more than $6 billion.

The contracts were awarded to a four-company joint venture of which The M.W. Kellogg Company, and later KBR, was a member.

Stanley, 65, a US citizen and resident of Houston, entered the plea before US District Judge Keith Ellison. He pleaded guilty to two-count criminal information charging him with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

Larry Veselka, Stanley's attorney in the criminal case, said his client had agreed to testify before a federal grand jury and would cooperate with the Justice Department attorneys in their ongoing investigation of the bribery scandal.

On the two conspiracy counts, Stanley faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $500,000 fine. Under his plea agreement, Stanley faces a sentence of seven years in prison and the payment of $10.8 million in restitution.

Without admitting or denying the allegations in the complaint, Stanley has consented to the entry of a final judgment in a Securities and Exchange Commission civil case and agreed to cooperate with the SEC's ongoing investigation.

The proposed settlement is subject to the court's approval.

In his statement, Friedrich said Stanley's "plea demonstrates that corporate executives who bribe foreign government officials in return for lucrative business deals can expect to face prosecution."

According to the DOJ, from 1995 to 2004 Stanley engaged in a scheme to bribe Nigerian government officials, officials of the Nigeria LNG consortium and government-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, the largest shareholder of NLNG with a 49 percent stake.

Stanley was the senior representative for his former employer on the joint ventures steering committee, which made major decisions on behalf of the joint venture, DOJ said.