Controversial British MP, Tony Baldry,  who was recently caught trying to help Nigerian fugitive politician James Ibori escape justice in the UK has been ordered to repay more than £12,000  of the allowances he overclaimed from the British parliament according to the recommendation by Sir Thomas Legg. A UK newspaper-Babury Guardian- reported that after an independent review, Mr. Baldry was found to have overclaimed expenses on his second-home allowance.  Mr. Baldry is one of 390 past and present MPs whom Sir Thomas Legg recommended should repay £1.3 million.

The MP, who has made some quick returns from trying to help Ibori, has started to repaying the required money to parliament.  “Mr Baldry has now repaid £12,197.36 relating to mortgage interest he claimed over the period 2004 to 2009,“ the Banbury Guardian said.

It also said that the bulk of the over-statement of mortgage interest relates to the two years ending 2005 and 2006.

Saharareporters has recently exposed the British MP over a 5-page letter he sent to the office of the UK Attorney General in a veiled attempt to interfere with the trial of associates of James Ibori in the UK by extensively questioning the UK’s attitude to James Ibori, who, before becoming state governor in Nigeria, had twice been convicted by the British for crimes.
  

Mr. Baldry, who visited with Nigeria’s now bed-ridden leader Umaru Yar’Adua in Septemeber of 2009 in Abuja on behalf of Ibori, returned to the UK and penned the woeful letter. He also reported to the UK parliamentary accounts office handsome payments he received in the course of his trip to Abuja.  In the MPs’ Register of Interests, he wrote: “Received fee of £22,012.57 from Zaiwalla & Co. (Solicitors to James Ibori), for advising clients. Time worked: 16 hours.”

In a curious twist of irony, the monies made from proceeds of Ibori's corruption might have been used by Mr. Baldry to repay his overclaimed allowances.

Last week the Nigeria Liberty Forum in London, led by Kayode Ogundamisi, appealed a decision by the UK FOI office declining to declassify Mr. Baldry’s letter to the UK justice minister. The NLF also officially filed complaints against Mr. Baldry at the UK Commissioner for Standards Office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards House of Commons. Further the NLF officially invited the UK commissioner of the Metropolitan police to investigate Mr. Baldry for fraud.

In response to the NLF, Mr. Baldry wrote to Saharareporters in attempt to clarify his stance, having apparently come under intense scrutiny in the UK.  He claimed that he had responded to the UK bar and the parliamentary ethics committee regarding his "innocence." Still, for all his "innocence," Mr. Badry has rebuffed all attempts to get him to release a copy of the letter he wrote on behalf of James Ibori, and for which he was so generously remunerated.

Meanwhile, the Southwark Crown Court will next Monday, February 15, begin the much-delayed criminal prosecution of Ibori’s associates in London. The court set aside the date after it threw out a motion by those associates to quash their trial precedent upon their controversial discharge by a compromised Nigerian Federal High Court judge, Justice Marcel Awokulehin, in Asaba, Delta State.

The associates in question include his sister, his mistress, his secretary, and his lawyer, each of whom is accused in connection with their role in Ibori's money-laundering escapades.  The trial of his wife will commence later in 2010.