By Abiola Olawale
A court document purportedly from a US Court has revealed that some officials of a Chinese firm, Zhongshan Fucheng Industrial Investment Co, were allegedly harassed and beaten by some individuals linked with the Ogun State Government.
According to the court document obtained by SaharaReporters,a US based Digital newspaper, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit accused the Ogun State Government of human rights abuses against executives of Zhongshan Fucheng Industrial.
The court documents revealed that some officials of the Chinese company were allegedly subjected to beatings, deprivation of food and water, and arrest at gunpoint, among other human rights violations.
In a court opinion filed purportedly by Judge Millett of the Columbia Circuit court, the alleged human rights abuse happened when Ogun state was attempting to terminate the contracts entered into with the Chinese firm on establishing a free trade zone in the state.
Part of the court document reads: “Things continued to deteriorate. One Ogun official texted a Zhongshan executive urging him ‘as a friend’ to ‘leave peacefully when there is opportunity to do so, and avoid forceful removal, complications[,] and possible prosecution[.]’
“The next month, Ogun issued an arrest warrant for two executives, alleging ‘criminal breach of trust[.]’ Nigerian federal police arrested one Zhongshan executive at gunpoint and held him for ten days. During that time, the police denied the executive food and water, beat him, intimidated him, and questioned him about the whereabouts of the other executive.
“It was noted that in the following month, Ogun issued an arrest warrant for two executives, alleging ‘criminal breach of trust.”
This is coming after a Judicial Court in Paris, on August 2, 2024, ordered the seizure of three Nigerian government-owned aircrafts in France.
The judgment came after a Chinese company, Zhongshan Fucheng Industrial Investment Co. Ltd, sought several orders from the court over an aborted contract between the company and Ogun State Government, which was initiated in 2007.
The New Diplomat reports that the Chinese firm had approached the court seeking an order compelling Nigeria to pay a $70 million investment treaty award.
The trouble began in 2010 when Zhongshan, through Zhuhai Zhongfu Industrial Group Co. Ltd (Zhuhai), its Chinese parent company, acquired rights to develop a free trade zone in Ogun state.
A year later, Zhongshan set up Zhongfu International Investment (NIG) FZE (Zhongfu), a Nigerian entity, to manage the project under the permission of the Ogun state government.
Things took a different turn in July 2016 when the company accused the state government of abruptly moving to terminate its appointment while attempting to install a new manager for the free trade zone.
Subsequently, Zhongfu initiated an investment treaty arbitration against Nigeria under the bilateral investment treaty between the People’s Republic of China and Nigeria (the China-Nigeria BIT).
The arbitrators had ruled that Nigeria was in breach of its obligations under the China-Nigeria BIT and awarded Zhongshan compensation of around $70 million.
In January 2022, the Chinese company initiated a case to seek enforcement of the arbitration award.
Nigeria pleaded state immunity but was turned away by Sara Cockerill, a high court judge, who said the country abused the time frame for appealing arbitral awards.
