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Binance Alleges Request of $150m Bribe by Some Nigerian Officials

Tigran Gambaryan, a compliance officer for Binance Holdings Ltd, giant cryptocurrency exchange, has alleged that the company was given 48 hours to make a payment of roughly $150 million in crypto to make its problems in Nigeria go away.

Richard Teng,, CEO, Binance Holdings Ltd
Also Richard Teng, chief executive officer of the company, in a recent blog post, confirmed that alleged extortion attempt the company faced in Nigeria.
Teng highlighted the demand for a significant payment to alleviate issues in the country amidst its crackdown on crypto and the devaluation of the naira.
“We were asked for a large payment in Nigeria to make problems there ‘go away’,” Teng stated, underscoring the challenges encountered by the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
He also reiterated Binance’s plea for the release of an employee detained in Nigeria.
But Gambaryan, a compliance officer for Binance said that on a trip to Nigeria in January,,he received an unsettling message:
The company had 48 hours to make a payment of roughly $150 million in crypto.
Mr. Gambaryan, a former U.S. law enforcement agent, understood the message as a request for a bribe from someone in the Nigerian government, according to five people familiar with the matter and messages reviewed by The New York Times.
He and a group of his Binance colleagues had just met with Nigerian legislators, who accused the company of tax violations and threatened to arrest its employees.
The Binance officials fled Nigeria in a panic. Later that month, Mr. Gambaryan wrote a three-page report describing the payment request and gave it to Binance’s lawyers, two people familiar with the report said.
He also alerted contacts in the Nigerian government, the people said, and recounted the incident to them.
The episode was the backdrop for a second trip to Nigeria that Mr. Gambaryan took in February.
On his return, he and a colleague, Nadeem Anjarwalla, were arrested by the Nigerian authorities, setting off a crisis at Binance.
Mr. Gambaryan has been held in Kuje prison in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja, for the last four weeks, after he was transferred there from a government compound on April 8.
His case is the latest legal headache for Binance, which agreed to a $4.3 billion fine last year to settle charges by the U.S. government that it allowed criminal activity to flourish on its platform. In April, the company’s founder, Changpeng Zhao, was sentenced to four months in prison for his role in those violations.
The Nigerian authorities have charged both Binance and Mr. Gambaryan with tax evasion and money laundering. Binance has denied that Mr. Gambaryan had any “decision-making power” in the company.
“The message from the Nigerian government is clear,” Binance’s chief executive, Richard Teng, wrote in a blog post on Tuesday. “We must detain an innocent, mid-level employee and a former U.S. federal agent, and place him in a dangerous prison in order to control Binance.”
Zakari Mijinyawa, a spokesman for Nigeria’s national security adviser, said in a text that the Nigerian government would make its case “on the strength of the facts and evidence, in accordance with due process.”
“We are confident that Nigeria has a good case,” Mr. Mijinyawa said. “Binance equally will have every opportunity under the rule of law to make its case and see justice delivered.”
In the blog post, Mr. Teng laid out the history of Binance’s engagement with Nigeria, which has become a hot spot for the crypto industry. It has the second-highest rate of crypto adoption in the world behind India, according to Chainalysis, a data firm.
In 2023, Nigerian financial regulators issued a statement directing Binance to stop soliciting investors in Nigeria. Binance halted its advertising in the country and offered to meet with government officials, Mr. Teng said.
But tensions continued to escalate. Over recent months, Nigerian officials have argued that trading on Binance contributed to the collapse of the country’s currency, the naira. And in December, a committee of the Nigerian House of Representatives asked that Binance representatives appear for a hearing.
On Jan. 8, Mr. Gambaryan and a group of Binance employees met with those lawmakers. Soon the meeting turned contentious:
The lawmakers read aloud a list of accusations against Binance, including tax violations.
They also threatened to pursue an arrest warrant for Mr. Teng, the blog post said.
As the Binance employees left the meeting, Mr. Teng wrote, they were approached by “unknown persons” who suggested that they make a payment to settle the allegations. Later, a local lawyer representing Binance spoke with someone purporting to be an agent of the House committee, Mr. Teng wrote.
The purported agent demanded “a significant payment in cryptocurrency to be paid in secret within 48 hours to make these issues go away,” Mr. Teng wrote. The amount was roughly $150 million, four people familiar with the matter said.
“Our team grew increasingly concerned about their safety in Nigeria and immediately departed,” Mr. Teng wrote in his post. “We, of course, declined the payment demand via our counsel, not viewing it to be a legitimate settlement offer.”
After he left Nigeria in January, Mr. Gambaryan discussed the incident with colleagues and circulated his report describing the payment request, two people familiar with the matter said.
Later that month, Mr. Gambaryan began setting up meetings with Nigerian security and financial crimes enforcement officials. At the time, he noted that senior leaders at the financial crimes office were eager to discuss what had happened during the Jan. 8 meeting, a person familiar with the conversations said.
In a text message last month, Dele Oyewale, a spokesman for Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, declined to comment on the payment solicitation.
He did not respond to a request for comment on Monday by New York Times.
In his post on Tuesday, Mr. Teng wrote that Binance had received assurances that Mr. Gambaryan would be safe if he returned to Nigeria.
A company adviser with deep local connections recommended that Binance officials meet with the Nigerian national security adviser’s office, Mr. Teng wrote.
Mr. Gambaryan and Mr. Anjarwalla arrived for that meeting on Feb. 26.
After a couple of hours of discussion, Mr. Teng wrote, a Nigerian financial crimes official took Mr. Gambaryan aside and told him that “everything was progressing well.”
Then different Nigerian officials entered the room, demanding that Binance provide granular information about its users in Nigeria — a request the company was unwilling to meet.
Mr. Gambaryan’s and Mr. Anjarwalla’s passports were confiscated, and the two men were held for three weeks in a secure compound.
On March 22, their lawyers received word that criminal charges were coming.
Mr. Anjarwalla escaped the next day. He left Nigeria and has not spoken publicly since.
Mr. Gambaryan was alone in the compound. Shortly after he arrived, financial crimes officials in Nigeria had sent a note to the U.S. Embassy in Abuja, according to a copy of the message viewed by The Times.
“It is important to emphasize that Mr. Tigran is currently having a discussion with our team and the intent of his stay is purely for the purpose of constructive dialogue,” the letter said. “We assure you that the individual is participating willingly.”
Mr. Gambaryan was soon transferred to Kuje, a notorious facility where the Islamic State staged a prison break in 2022.
A trial was scheduled to begin last Thursday, but the court postponed it until May 17.
News
INTERPOL Report Shows Cybercrime is West, East African Most Dominant Security Concern

Cybercrime has emerged as a dominant security concern across Africa, with more than 30 percent of all reported crimes in Western and Eastern regions linked to cyber activity, according to the newly released 2025 Africa Cyberthreat Assessment Report by INTERPOL.
The report, based on data from African member states and private sector partners, reveals that two-thirds of surveyed countries describe cybercrime as constituting a medium to high share of total criminal cases.
This highlights how cyber-enabled criminal activity is evolving rapidly across the continent. The report identified alarming spikes in scam attempts, with some countries witnessing a 3,000 percent increase in suspected scam notifications in the past year.
Neal Jetton, INTERPOL’s Cyber Crime Director, warned that the threat landscape is evolving faster than enforcement responses.
“This fourth edition of the INTERPOL African Cyber Threat Assessment provides a vital snapshot of the current situation, informed by operational intelligence, extensive law enforcement engagement, and strategic private-sector collaboration.
“It paints a clear picture of a threat landscape in flux, with emerging dangers like AI-driven fraud that demand urgent attention. No single agency or country can face these challenges alone,” Jetton stated.
In the past year, suspected scam notifications rose by up to 3,000 per cent in some African countries, according to data from Kaspersky, one of several private sector partners that work with INTERPOL’s cybercrime directorate
Online scams, particularly through phishing, are the most frequently reported cybercrimes across the continent. Ransomware attacks and Business Email Compromise (BEC) incidents are also increasing, particularly in Nigeria, Kenya, South Africa, and Egypt.
“Ransomware detections in Africa also rose in 2024, with South Africa and Egypt suffering the highest number, at 17,849 and 12,281 detections respectively, according to data from Trend Micro, followed by other highly digitised economies such as Nigeria (3,459) and Kenya (3,030),” it stated.
Incidents included attacks on critical infrastructure, such as a breach at Kenya’s Urban Roads Authority (KURA), and on government databases, such as hacks of Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the report stated.
News
GSK to Slash Cost of Malaria Jab to Less than $5

The manufacturers of the world’s first malaria vaccine are set to slash the price by more than half by 2028 to less than$5 per dose.
The manufacturers of the shot, known as RTS,S, said a phased reduction in cost would begin immediately, with an ultimate aim to reduce the price to less than $5.
The announcement could hardly come at a more critical moment.
Gavi, a major vaccination initiative which funds immunisations in the world’s poorest countries, is facing a major budget crunch.
In Brussels on Wednesday, Gavi’s replenishment event raised $9 billion to fund immunisation programmes over the next five years. While this sounds like a huge sum, it’s significantly less than the $11.9bn the group had been aiming for.
Governments around the world are cutting development spending dramatically.
The UK, for instance, cut its contribution to Gavi by 40 per cent in real terms, telling The Telegraph it was prioritising defence, while the US has pledged nothing at all.
Though America previously gave Gavi roughly $300m a year, the country’s new health secretary claimed without evidence that the organisation was ignoring vaccine safety.
The announcement from the British pharmaceutical giant GSK and Indian drugmaker Bharat Biotech will therefore be a relief to those trying to balance the books.
In a statement the companies said the price reduction demonstrated their “commitment to Gavi”, and was “driven by process improvements, expanded production capacity, cost-effective manufacturing, and minimal profit margins”.
By the time the price has fallen to below $5 per dose, a technology transfer agreement means Bharat will have taken over production, though GSK will continue to supply the adjuvant piece of the shot.
“For us, this is more than a cooperation, it’s a promise,” said Dr Krishna Ella, executive chairman of Bharat Biotech International Limited.
“By joining forces with GSK, and working closely with Gavi, and the WHO [World Health Organization], we are taking a real step toward closing the gap between vaccine supply and the urgent needs of children at risk of malaria.”
Each year, malaria still kills 500,000 people – the vast majority of them children aged five and under in sub-Saharan Africa.
According to WHO estimates, cases and deaths fell significantly between 2000 and 2015, but progress has since stalled.
Some have high hopes that RTS,S, as well as another vaccine called R21 developed by Oxford University, could prove critical in efforts to turn the tide.
In clinical trials, RTS,S reduced hospitalisations for severe malaria by 30 per cent.
But critics say the shot is too expensive and not as effective as existing tools, such as bed nets and antimalarials.
The reduction in price will bring it more in line with the cost of R21, which is priced at around $4 per dose.
Yet the cost will still add up, as both jabs require multiple shots. For RTS,S, this means four doses – the first three doses are given monthly, starting around five months of age, while the fourth dose is administered 15-18 months later.
Both jabs “provide reasonable short term efficacy – over about a year – so are a useful addition to other measures,” said Professor Nick White, a professor at the Mahidol-Oxford Tropical Medicine Research Unit who specialises in malaria.
“In the past GSK had limited production capacity – one of the reasons the R21 was developed. So reducing the price will be good and the two comparable vaccines can fight it out in the market place.”
A spokesperson for Gavi said the alliance’s goal is to “create sustainable demand backed by predictable financing so that companies – like GSK and Bharat – can continue investing in technology transfer and other efficiencies that bring down costs, thus making critical vaccines more available and affordable.
GSK’s decision to lower its prices, the spokesperson added, is “an important step for the global malaria vaccination programme, and our ability to make this lifesaving tool more widely available to those who need it the most”.
Gavi plans to help fund RTS,S in 12 African countries by the end of this year.
Previously, GSK has said it will supply up to 18 million vaccine doses between 2023 and the end of this year.
The company plans to supply 15 million doses annually from 2026-2028, a spokesperson told Reuters.
News
Rack Centre Signs Collocation Deal with TelCables Nigeria

Rack Centre, West Africa’s Tier III carrier- and cloud-neutral data centre, has struck a collocation agreement with TelCables Nigeria, an Angola Cables subsidiary.
TelCables Nigeria is delivering its high-capacity network and cloud infrastructure, as well as four international subsea cable systems (SACS, MONET, SEBRAS, and EllaLink), directly into Rack Centre’s regional carrier ecosystem as part of the agreement.
According to Angola Cables, the move provides reliable, low-latency south-bound routes to Europe, the Americas, and Latin America, reducing the danger of future cable disruptions along West Africa’s coast and enabling next-generation cloud services across the continent.
“Our unique Africa – to – Latin America route via SACS, combined with MONET, SEBRAS and EllaLink, gives customers the lowest – latency paths to the Americas and Europe,” said Fernando Fernandes, CEO of TelCables Nigeria.
“Businesses in latency sensitive sectors: financial services, content delivery and real-time communications will experience faster transactions, reduced lag and an enhanced user experience.
“By hosting at Rack Centre we also localise Clouds2Africa resources, price them in naira, and remove expensive ingress/egress charges or FX exposure.”
Rack Centre said its 13.5MW data centre campus designed with its recently launched LGS2 facility that delivers a design PUE of 1.35 and powered from sustainable energy sources, already hosts 70+ carriers, ISPs and network operators.
Lars Johannisson, CEO of Rack Centre, commented: “Adding a global operator of Angola Cables’ calibre through TelCables Nigeria dramatically deepens our connectivity fabric.
“We can now offer 99.95 % SLA routes to more destinations, enabling enterprises, governments and cloud providers to meet performance and data-residency requirements while keeping traffic local.”
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