Fresh N180bn Loans Uncovered in Intercontinental Bank
114 viewsFresh allegations have emerged in Abuja that a former Managing Director of Intercontinental Bank, Dr. Erastus Akingbola, granted N180bn loans to his associates and companies he had interest in.
The total debt stock of the bank, as announced by the Central Bank of Nigeria in August, was N210.9bn.
Akingbola was one of the five bank managing directors sacked by the CBN Governor, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, on August 15.
He is currently said to be living in the United Kingdom, from where he is challenging his removal in court.
But an EFCC operative told our correspondent on Tuesday that Akingbola gave a part of the N180bn loans to some ex-directors of the bank.
According to the source, the beneficiaries largely used the loans to buy Intercontinental Bank shares.
The former bank chief was also said to have transferred £8.5m to London in March 2009 and another £1.3m in July.
Our source said, “The N180bn is a new discovery. It is not impossible for our team of investigators to make fresh discoveries. Akingbola is not the only one; we have made a breakthrough, which will soon be in the public domain.”
The source said Tropics Properties and Bankinson Nigeria Limited are some of the companies Akingbola had interest in through which the loans were taken.
According to him, Tropics Properties received a loan of N4.4bn in May 2009 and later N4.3bn, while Bankinson got N1.2bn.
He added that five directors were said to have received N8bn loans each to purchase the bank’s shares.
It was also alleged that in 2008, some of the directors obtained N10.6bn loan each.
When contacted on the telephone for comments on the N180bn loan approval by Akingbola, the EFCC Head of Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Babafemi, said, “Your figure may be correct, but I know that investigation into this is still going on. I will not say more than that.”
The discovery of the N180bn loans came just as the EFCC said it had discovered that the N747bn non-performing loans of Union Bank of Nigeria Plc., FinBank Plc., Afribank Plc., Intercontinental Bank and Oceanic International Bank Plc, were bloated.
It was learnt through another source at the anti-graft agency that the commission had recovered 60 per cent of what it considered as the total debts owed the banks.
Total debt recovery by the EFCC stood at N171bn as at November 3.
On Monday, Intercontinental Bank declared that it had recovered N78bn in three months. It also said its target was N100bn before the end of the year.
In concluding that the N747bn debt was bloated, our correspondent gathered that EFCC cited a fraud that involved one of the former managing directors of the three banks that failed the second round of the CBN stress test.
The source said, “We have discovered that some of these ex-managing directors cooked up their books to cover up monies they took from the banks.
“And when the CBN went for inspection, it was these misleading records that they forwarded to them. So, the figure may not be as high as we thought in the case of the N747bn.”
He explained that the said former bank chief executives habitually rejected loan applications, but turned round to use the documents to secure facilities in favour of their numerous companies.
The source noted that the fraud was usually perpetrated by debiting the amount taken from the bank against the applicant that was originally denied loan.
According to him, a woman’s protest against N5bn loan debit in one of the three banks that failed the second round of the CBN special audit when the EFCC swooped on debtors led to the discovery of the scam.
This pattern of fraud, he added, was a major trend in financial abuses linked to one of the former managing directors.
Source: Punchng.com
Filed Under: Financial News • Industry News
