INVESTIGATION: Pension thief Maina bought US properties before money laundering conviction

In 2010, while Nigerian pensioners queued endlessly for unpaid benefits, Abdulrasheed Maina was quietly shopping for homes in the United States. In August that same year, the man who was then entrusted by the Nigerian government to clean up a corruption-ridden pension system walked into a Kentucky real estate office and bought a $215,000 house.

But that purchase was only the start. Between 2010 and 2013, while serving as chairman of the Presidential Task Force on Pension Reforms, Mr Maina purchased two more houses in Kentucky and one in the United Arab Emirates, soon after he was removed from office.

The Nigerian government accused him of siphoning millions of dollars from the pension fund he was meant to safeguard during the same period.

A cross-border investigation by PREMIUM TIMES, the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), and the Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa (PPLAAF) has now revealed for the first time where and when Mr Maina amassed these properties worth over $1.3 million.

The investigation also uncovered a pattern of name changes, corporate manoeuvres, and legal claims that raise questions about what his ex-wife, Laila, knew about the source of her former husband’s wealth.

The Pension Reformer Who Bought Cash Homes

Mr Maina was appointed by the Goodluck Jonathan administration in 2010 to sanitise a corrupt pension system. The assignment included enrolling pensioners through biometric verification to eliminate ghost workers.

US Property records reviewed by PREMIUM TIMES and its partners show that he paid “cash in hand” for the home in Kentucky in August 2010, meaning no mortgage or loan was involved.

According to his indictment by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Mr Maina stole $1.8 million from public funds through fraudulent biometrics contracts in the month before this purchase.

One year later, in 2011, Mr Maina deployed another strategy. Using VIU Investment LLC, an American company he controlled, he bought two additional homes in Frankfort for a combined $415,000. Again, the deeds specified payment with “cash in hand.”

In June 2013, as allegations of corruption began to surface publicly in Nigeria, Mr Maina expanded his portfolio to Dubai. He purchased a two-bedroom hotel apartment in Upper Crest for nearly $700,000. This property is currently registered in the name of his daughter, Farida Abdulrasheed Maina.

Court documents indicate that Mr Maina and his personal secretary allegedly stole over $1 million from Nigeria’s pension fund between 2010 and 2013. This timing coincides precisely with his acquisitions of American property.

Nigerian authorities accused Mr Maina of stealing pensioners’ funds equivalent to the purchase price of the three homes shortly before acquiring the properties.

Our investigation shows that his ex-wife, Laila, quietly took ownership of one of these American properties in a divorce settlement.

Laila Abdulrasheed Maina, 51, divorced her husband in a Kentucky court in 2022, just months after he was convicted of money laundering. The divorce settlement awarded her the $215,000 home in Frankfort, Kentucky—a property Mr Maina had purchased with cash in 2010, during the same period he allegedly looted the pension fund he was appointed to reform.

The EFCC never attempted to seize the US properties, and no details have been made public until now.

When contacted, EFCC spokesperson Dele Oyewale would not comment on the content of the investigation except to say that the agency would likely investigate assets Mr Maina held in the US that might have been obtained with illicit proceeds.

“If we have the information in that regard, we would want to pursue it,” Mr Oyewale said.

Mr Maina’s son, Faisal Maina, was also found guilty of money laundering in a separate trial in 2021 for his role in diverting allegedly stolen funds. Faisal was sentenced in absentia after fleeing on bail. The EFCC said he now resides in the US.

Mr Maina did not respond to requests for comment. His media assistant told our partners, the OCCRP, that “he is not interested” in responding to our enquiries.

The Property Shuffle

As scrutiny intensified in Nigeria, Mr Maina moved to protect his American assets. In January 2013, he transferred ownership of the two VIU Investment LLC properties, first to himself personally, then immediately to the “Abdulrasheed Maina Children’s Trust.”

The former pension boss fled Nigeria for Dubai in March 2013.

When he returned to Nigeria in 2017, a PREMIUM TIMES investigation sparked public outrage by uncovering his secret reinstatement and promotion while he was a fugitive.

The EFCC subsequently declared him wanted. He was eventually arrested and indicted for money laundering in 2019.

During the 2019 raid to arrest Mr Maina and his son, Faisal drew a pistol and rammed a bulletproof Range Rover through a hotel gate in an unsuccessful escape attempt.

After fleeing trial a second time, Mr Maina was rearrested in the Republic of Niger following an Interpol red notice and extradited to Nigeria.

In November 2021, he was sentenced to eight years’ imprisonment for money laundering offences involving N2 billion in pension funds.

In the charge marked FHC/ABJ/CR/256/2019, the EFCC alleged that Mr Maina used fictitious names to open and operate various bank accounts. He also recruited his relatives, who were bank officials, to operate fake bank accounts through which illicit funds were channelled.

Three of his biological siblings—two sisters and one brother—appeared in court as prosecution witnesses to testify against him. His two sisters told the court how Mr Maina fraudulently obtained their details and utility bills to open accounts for his Common Input Property and Investment Ltd, with which he perpetrated the fraud for which he was convicted. The company was also convicted and ordered to be wound up by the court.

“The convict’s salary as a civil servant was a little above N300,000, and could not have amounted to N2 billion even if he was saving all his salaries for 35 years,” Federal High Court judge Okon Abang observed in his sentencing of Mr Maina for money laundering.

Mr Maina continues to face embezzlement charges in a separate trial.

The Nigerian Correctional Service said Mr Maina was released on 25 February, 2025. It said he was released earlier than his due date due to his good conduct in prison.

“In accordance with established legal principles, his sentence commenced from the date of arrest, 25th October 2019. Furthermore, pursuant to Order 138 of the Nigerian Correctional Service Standing Orders (Custodial), Revised Edition 2020, inmates who demonstrate good conduct and industry are eligible for statutory remission. Mr Maina qualified for such remission under the extant rules, resulting in an Earliest Date of Release of 25th February 2025, which was duly effected,” the Service said in a response to an FOI request.

Since then, he maintained a low profile until last week, when a branch of the Nigerian Bar Association appointed him as its patron and presented him with the “Rule of Law and Courage Award” at a ceremony.

At the event, Mr Maina again maintained his innocence, claiming that top officials in the Buhari administration were persecuting him. However, his reputation remains far from rehabilitated.

The day after the ceremony, the national leadership of the NBA condemned his appointment and announced disciplinary proceedings against Anthony Ojo, the NBA Garki Branch President, who presented the award.

The Strategic Divorce

In July 2021, a few months before Mr Maina’s conviction, Laila petitioned a Kentucky family court to dissolve their 30-year marriage. Her petition stated that the marriage “is irretrievably broken and there exists no reasonable prospect of reconciliation.”

Because Mr Maina had already begun serving his sentence, the court appointed a “Guardian Ad Litem” to represent him during the divorce proceedings.

The divorce judgement, finalised in 2022, transferred the $215,000 Frankfort home entirely to Laila. She also received custody of a minor child and control of bank accounts totalling approximately $32,000.

Mr Maina retained control of a credit union account containing $90,457.44.

The two other Kentucky homes remain under the Abdulrasheed Maina Children’s Trust.

Two Names, Two Countries

After the divorce, Laila formally changed her name to Laila Duke Williams in late 2022. She has used this identity in multiple property and corporate filings in the United States.

But in Nigeria, she continues to operate as Laila Abdulrasheed Maina—the identity she has maintained since marrying Mr Maina in Kaduna in 1995.

Corporate Affairs Commission records show that in May 2024, nearly two years after adopting her new American name, Laila incorporated two companies in Nigeria using “Laila Abdulrasheed Maina.”

Both she and Mr Maina hold dual Nigerian and American citizenship, as do their children.

The Claims That Didn’t Hold

The divorce raises additional questions when examined alongside Laila’s actions in Nigerian courts.

In Kentucky, Laila told the family court she was unemployed when filing for divorce. Yet approximately one year earlier, she had attempted to convince a Nigerian court that she owned some of the 23 properties the EFCC was moving to seize from Mr Maina.

In an affidavit submitted to the Nigerian court, Laila claimed she purchased these properties with proceeds from her business exporting African fabrics to the United States. She provided no evidence of income from such a business.

The EFCC countered that Laila had never engaged in any exportation business, either in Nigeria or the United States.

In her Kentucky divorce filing, court records indicate that Laila renounced any claim to properties she and Mr Maina held outside the United States—yet she was simultaneously fighting in Nigerian courts to claim ownership of those very properties.

All 23 Nigerian properties, including one Mr Maina bought with $1.4 million in cash, were ultimately forfeited to the Nigerian government in a final court ruling in 2024.

Assets Beyond Nigeria’s Reach

While Nigerian authorities successfully recovered properties within the country’s borders, the assets Mr Maina acquired abroad during his alleged embezzlement period have remained beyond their reach.

The Kentucky properties and the Dubai apartment remain under the control of Mr Maina’s ex-wife and children.

Stefan Cassella, former deputy chief of the US Department of Justice Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, told PREMIUM TIMES and its partners that Laila could potentially face money laundering charges if American authorities determine she knew about the criminal origin of funds used to purchase the property.

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“If she was a party to that knowing that it was criminally derived property, then the United States could charge her with a money-laundering offence in Kentucky,” Mr Cassella explained.

However, he noted that such prosecution would only be possible if the statute of limitations, five years from when she took possession of the property, had not expired. In this case, the statute of limitations has not yet expired, as she took control of the property in 2022.

Laila did not respond to requests for comment sent through multiple channels.