A Germany-based Nigerian medical doctor, Dr. Onuoha Onyeukwu, has petitioned President Goodluck Jonathan over the refusal of a German company, SIEMENS to pay him the sum of N63, 244, 060.00 as commissions due to him for assisting the company to obtain lucrative transactions in Nigeria.
In the petition which was written on his behalf by his lawyer, Ernest Annie Nwoye, from the chambers of E-Law and Company, the 76- year-old medical doctor said he entered into an agency agreement on July 16, 1986, with SIEMENS as its agent for some contracts in Nigeria and the company agreed to pay five per cent of the net contract price for his effort.
The terms of agreement between Onyeukwu and SIEMENS on July 18, 1987, said: “Dr. Onyeukwu will receive as consideration for his effort five per cent of the contract price pro rata of the instalment actually received by INTERATOM, and all foregoing arrangements, agreements and the like on this subject.”
Onyeukwu, who has resided in Germany for about 40 years, said SIEMEN had reneged on its own terms of the agreement, after securing several contracts in Nigeria, despite the fact that he bore the cost of flights and hotel accommodation between Germany and Nigeria, while pursuing the contracts for the company.
In the petition dated June 1, 2013, which was captioned ‘Refusal of SIEMENS to pay my agreed fee for promoting nuclear technology project in Nigeria and other contracts executed by SIEMENS (INTERATOM) in Nigeria since 1985 to date totalling 307,010,000 Euros (N63, 244, 060,
000.00),’ the medical practitioner pleaded with President Jonathan to intervene and assist him in the matter.
According to his lawyer, Onyeukwu is a respected resident in Germany with unblemished record who, because of his love for his country, Nigeria, started making moves to see how he could attract any reasonable development to Nigeria in the 1980s.
“One of his efforts worked out in 1985 or thereabout when he met with the German Government and by his personal efforts, convinced the German Government to establish links (investment) with Nigeria who later introduced our client to a German company called SIEMENS, to liaise with them and see areas of interest at the time when the
company was about leaving Nigeria because of non-award of contracts by Nigerian Government.
“Our client single handedly promoted and introduced SIEMENS to Nigerian government through SIEMENS representative, Dr Roegler and his team from the Dept of Energy and Technology (INTERATOM).
“At the end of series of meetings with the Nigerian government, the following were agreed on as the areas of interest for Nigeria:
‘Nuclear technology, building of electric power stations, construction of telephone network (wireless and landline) and
construction/introduction of new railway system’.” Onyeukwu was said to have travelled from Germany to Nigeria to meet
top government officials while pursuing the contracts on behalf of the German company.
“He travelled to Nigeria over 40 times, most often with Roegler, attending meetings with the then Head of State, Gen Ibrahim Babangida (rtd). In all the visits in respect to those projects, our client paid all his expenses.
While listing several projects executed by SIEMEN through Onyeukwu’s intervention, his lawyer complained that “Our client is worried that SIEMENS has refused to pay him the agreed five percent for his efforts, resources and time spent with respect to promoting SIEMENS in Nigeria.”
