Diepreye Alamieyeseigha — Bayelsa proceeds

Diepreye Solomon Peter Alamieyeseigha (DSP) was elected the first civilian Governor of Bayelsa State in 1999. On 15 September 2005 the London Metropolitan Police arrested him at Heathrow on suspicion of money laundering; £1m in cash was recovered from his Maida Vale residence, and properties valued at over £10m in London were restrained. On 20 November 2005 he disappeared from London and reappeared in Yenagoa — an escape widely (though never judicially established) reported as effected disguised as a woman. The Bayelsa House of Assembly impeached him on 9 December 2005. He was arraigned by the EFCC at the Federal High Court Lagos and on 26 July 2007 pleaded guilty before Mohammed Shuaibu J. (FHC/L/328c/05) to 6 counts of making false declarations of assets. He was sentenced to time served (about two years on remand) and forfeited assets in the UK, South Africa, Cyprus, Denmark and the United States with a combined declared value above $17.7m. On 12 March 2013, President Goodluck Jonathan — who had served as Alamieyeseigha's deputy and succeeded him as Governor — granted him a presidential pardon, a decision condemned by the US State Department, the UK Foreign Office and Transparency International. He died on 10 October 2015.