A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has given the go-ahead for the permanent forfeiture of $13 million linked to businesswoman Aisha Achimugu and her firm, Oceangate Engineering Oil & Gas Ltd, handing the funds over to the Federal Government.

In a ruling delivered on Wednesday, Justice Emeka Nwite said the company failed to convincingly show that the money came from legitimate sources. The judge agreed with the position of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), which had argued that the funds were linked to suspicious financial activity.

At the heart of the case was Oceangate’s attempt to reclaim the money after it had earlier been temporarily seized by the court. But the judge found gaps in the company’s explanation, particularly its claim that the funds were gifts.

According to the court, none of the alleged donors appeared to back that claim, and Achimugu herself did not step forward to defend the source of the money.

The court also pointed out that there was little evidence to show the company generated such funds through actual business operations. No clear records of transactions, clients, or revenue streams were presented to justify the amount in question.

The case traces back to 2025, when the EFCC secured a court order to freeze the funds while investigations were ongoing. The anti-graft agency had raised concerns that part of the money used by Oceangate in Nigeria’s oil licensing process may have come from questionable sources.

Investigators claimed the company paid millions of dollars to secure oil blocks, but alleged that $13 million of that sum was sourced through informal cash deals involving middlemen and unregulated foreign exchange channels, transactions that largely bypassed the banking system.
There were also claims that some funds originated from contractors with no known business ties to the company, raising further red flags.

While Oceangate denied any wrongdoing, insisting the funds were clean and properly sourced, the EFCC maintained that the company could not prove otherwise. The agency went further to describe the firm as a structure with limited operational footprint, questioning the credibility of its financial records.

In the end, the court sided with the EFCC, ruling that the company did not do enough to counter the allegations or prove ownership of the funds beyond doubt.

This latest decision adds to an earlier forfeiture order involving $7 million recovered in Lagos, where no claimant came forward.