The get-away vessel of choice of celebrity couple Beyoncé andJay-Z, the luxury yacht Galactica Star is continuing to make waves before the American courts. The 65m-long vessel, which has a top speed of 27 knots and was built by Heesen Yachts of the Netherlands, was one of the biggest acquisitions made by Nigerian traders Kola Aluko and Jide Omokore, then at the height of their glory as former oil minister Diezani Alison-Madueke showered them with advantageous contracts. A former executive with Anglo-Dutch oil major Shell, Alison-Madueke headed the group's Nigerian subsidiary in 2006 and 2007 and went on to become the first woman to head OPEC while she was Nigerian oil minister from 2010 to 2015. An all-powerful figure in the administration of former president Goodluck Jonathan, she is suspected of having helped Aluko et Omokore, then at the head of oil company Atlantic Energy, to obtain major service contracts from Nigerian Petroleum Development Company, a subsidiary of state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NPCC), as well as numerous cargoes of crude oil at knock-down prices, which the pair then sold to the trading giants at a comfortable profit. Their profits were shared by their government patron since some of the many assets the pair acquired in London and Texas (apartments, furniture, works of art) were earmarked for the minister's exclusive use. All these assets, including the Galactica Star, were seized, however, by the American courts in June 2018.
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