Nigeria wins as UK Supreme Court upholds £44m costs order against P&ID
The United Kingdom Supreme Court has ordered Process and Industrial Developments (P&ID), an offshore company, to pay up to £44 million in legal costs to Nigeria.
The decision concludes a decade-long arbitration dispute once valued at over $11 billion, which, if enforced, could have crippled Nigeria’s economy.
Delivering judgment on October 22, 2025, a five-member panel led by Lord Reed, President of the Supreme Court, ruled unanimously that P&ID must pay the costs in pounds sterling, not in Nigerian naira, as the company had urged.
The Supreme Court affirmed the earlier decisions of the UK Commercial Court and the Court of Appeal, which held that Nigeria’s legal expenses, incurred and paid in sterling should be recovered in the same currency.
The ruling is a victory for Nigeria, drawing to a close a legal saga that exposed corruption, misconduct, and a complex scheme to defraud Africa’s largest economy.
It also underscores the importance of decisive leadership and international legal cooperation in protecting national assets from fraudulent claims.
The dispute began in 2010 when P&ID signed a gas supply and processing agreement with the Nigerian government.
In 2019, an arbitral tribunal in London awarded the firm $9.6 billion in damages against Nigeria, a figure that later grew to more than $11 billion with interest.
The judgment immediately placed Nigeria’s foreign assets and reserves at risk of seizure, prompting a coordinated government response.
Concerned by the threat to the nation’s reserves, then Central Bank governor Godwin Emefiele approached President Muhammadu Buhari for approval to allow the bank to finance and coordinate Nigeria’s legal defence.
Buhari granted the request, directing the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Abubakar Malami, to work with the CBN in pursuing an appeal.
When several leading British law firms declined to take on the case due to the elapsed appeal window, Mishcon de Reya LLP accepted the brief, relying on Section 68 of the UK Arbitration Act, which permits challenges to arbitral awards obtained by fraud.
The case began in 2020, and by August 2023, the UK Commercial Court had delivered a stunning victory for Nigeria, ruling that P&ID had procured its contract through bribery and deceit.
That decision reversed the earlier award and saved Nigeria from paying billions of dollars in damages.
Robin Knowles (Justice), who presided over the 2023 case, found that P&ID’s representatives had paid bribes to Nigerian officials and unlawfully retained privileged government documents to advance their claims.
The judge also criticised two of P&ID’s London-based lawyers, Trevor Burke KC and Seamus Andrews, for making an “indefensible decision” to use Nigeria’s internal documents that they were not entitled to see.
He noted that both men stood to gain massive personal rewards, £850 million and £3 billion respectively had P&ID succeeded.
Their cases were subsequently referred to the Bar Standards Board and the Solicitors Regulation Authority for disciplinary action.
Following the 2023 victory, Nigeria incurred substantial legal expenses amounting to £44.2 million, paid across 116 invoices between November 2019 and November 2024.
P&ID later appealed the order to pay those costs in sterling, arguing that the payment should be made in naira to prevent Nigeria from benefiting from favourable exchange rates, particularly following the sharp depreciation of the naira after its float in 2023.
In a joint judgment delivered by Lord Hodge and Lady Simler, with the concurrence of Lords Reed, Stephens, and Richards, the Court held that legal costs are not compensatory in nature but a statutory indemnity for expenses reasonably incurred during litigation.
According to the justices, “As Nigeria had incurred liability and made payments in sterling, the court ought to make a costs order in sterling.”
The Court further emphasised that costs awards differ from damages in contract or tort cases.
It noted that costs are discretionary and meant to provide a fair contribution to legal expenses, not to compensate for financial loss.
The justices warned that adopting P&ID’s position would encourage unnecessary and expensive side litigation about how litigants fund their legal fees.
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They stressed that there was no legal requirement under the Senior Courts Act 1981 or the Civil Procedure Rules 1998 for costs orders to be made only in sterling, but reaffirmed that awards should generally reflect the currency in which legal services were billed and paid.
Sources close to the case confirmed the behind-the-scenes efforts that ensured Nigeria’s success.
“The judgment shook the country to its core. But the former CBN governor rose to the occasion, declaring that Nigeria didn’t have the money to pay such colossal sums.
“He chose to fight instead of folding to fraudsters who wanted to burden generations of Nigerians with a fake debt”, the source said.
The UK Supreme Court’s ruling now cements Nigeria’s victory, affirming its right to recover full legal costs in sterling and bringing final closure to a case that spanned more than a decade.
