FEMI OTEDOLA CONFIRMS HE PAID $620,000 TO HON FAROUK LAWAN TO EXONERATE ZENON OIL FROM AD-HOC COMMITEE REPORT

Femi Otedola,Chairman of Zenon Oil has confimed to Thisday Newspapers that he did pay $620,000 to Hon Lawan Farouk to remove Zenon oil from the list of companies who bought foreign exchange but did not import fuel under the fuel subsidy regime.According to Otedola,Zenon only imports diesel.Otedola,
said to his surprise, a few days before the report of the ad-hoc committee was tabled before the House of Representatives,Hon Farouk called him to demand for $3m to have Zenon's name removed from the list.

He initially refused to pay any money because Zenon Oil had not done anything wrong and he told Farouk he wasn't paying.When the report was submitted to the House,he said he was shocked to see Zenon's name on the list and he immediatelly called Lawan who told him that Otedola would have to pay up to have Zenon's name removed from the list.At this point Otedola decided to get the state security service (SSS) involved and a sting operation was planned.

The SSS gave Otedola serialised dollar bills for the sting job and also secretly videod Lawan on two occassions he came to collect money from Otedola.After $600,000 had been paid,Zenon's name was removed from the list by Lawan who convinced House members that there was an error with Zenon's name on the list.
Subsequently,Zenon was taken off the list.Otedola was to pay the balance later.The video and audio recordings reports say have been shown to the president,vice-president and senate president.