The Chairman of House of Representatives Committee on Banking and Currency, Sir Jones Chukwudi Onyereri, has disclosed that the House of Representatives was currently working at amending the Act establishing the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) to give it more powers on debt recovery.
He said the proposed amendment would further empower and embolden AMCON to go after its debtors especially those who believe they can ride on some loopholes in the Act to perpetually engage AMCON in court.
Onyereri made the disclosure in Abuja at a one-day technical session with stakeholders such as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Nigeria Insurance Deposit Corporation (NDIC), members of the House Committee on Banking and Currency and AMCON management, among others, where the challenges inhibiting AMCON from recovery were extensively discussed.
The committee also used the occasion to listen to presentations from the representatives of CBN, NDIC and legal luminaries, among others, on how AMCON could function optimally as well as meet its mandate before sunset.
Speaking at the forum, Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of AMCON, Mr. Ahmed Kuru, described his assignment at AMCON as “very difficult,” but said there was need to change the recovery approach at the corporation with the backing of the National Assembly especially since the remaining crop of AMCON debtors are defiant, recalcitrant and business heavyweights who have the financial wherewithal to repay their debts but have refused to pay by going to court to tie up AMCON.
Kuru said, “we have been doing this for the past seven years and we have realised that what we need now at this time in the life of AMCON is legislative help that would make it possible to recover these debts effectively and efficiently.
At AMCON, we believe that the Act establishing the corporation can be amended as many times as possible by the National Assembly as long as they think it is appropriate to do so in the interest of the Nigerian economy. Given the difficulties we are facing presently, we are of the opinion that the Act establishing AMCON should be amended to reflect our sunset period.
“We are making this suggestion because we have over the years realised that some of our obligors have since established other lifestyles that are different from what brought them to AMCON so the best we can do as a law abiding agency of the government is take them to court. But the wheel of justice grinds slowly in the country so something drastic must be done if we all want AMCON to meet its mandate at sunset. So we suggest that the National Assembly amends the Act establishing AMCON in such a way that the assets of the obligor(s) are automatically transferred to AMCON. From what we know, some of the obligors are working hard to ensure that the cases they have with AMCON in different courts outlive the lifespan of AMCON.”
Again Kuru said, “our recovery assignment is a difficult one and in recent years business has been quite challenging in the country. For that reason, we are sitting on a lot of assets because of the unstable liquidity situation and as you know most of our assets are challenged one way or the other. But we are hopeful that things are looking up in 2018, meaning that AMCON’s projections too look positive. However, we will continue to be prudent in terms of our spending and running cost generally. But at the end, we will continue to insist that to meet our expectation at sunset, we do expect a lot of amendments of our Act as is from the National Assembly. Once we have that backing, I assure you that AMCON would meet your expectations.”