Former President Muhammadu Buhari, on Sunday, said the country would have paid $15 billion if it had lost the case against the international firm, Process & Industrial Development Limited.

He lamented that such monetary loss could be substituted to finance key infrastructural projects, among others.

Following a 2010 agreement between P$ID and the Federal Government, the firm pledged to build a gas processing plant in Nigeria.

However, the project never materialised, leading P&ID to sue for lost profits. The firm was granted the sizable award plus accumulated interest, which became a point of contention.

In a ruling on Monday, October 23, Justice Robert Knowles of the Business and Property Court in London held that the process through which P&ID secured the contract was fraudulent.

Reacting to the matter, Buhari recalled that during his administration in 2015, he asked his former Chief of Staff, Abba Kyari, and erstwhile Attorney-General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, to “get us a fair hearing.”

He noted that the firm, owned by Irish intermediaries who understood the systematics of the Nigerian market, won the contract to build a gas processing plant in Cross Rivers State.