From Uche Usim, Abuja
The Federal Government via the Task Force on the Implementation of the Failed Bank Act, yesterday gave notice to re-arrest for prosecution, directors and officers of licensed banks who committed banking malpractices and fled.
Director of Legal, Nigerian Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), Mr. B.A Taribo, in a statement said the task force reviewed some pending investigations by the Police Financial Malpractices Investigation Unit (FMIU), under the Failed Banks Act comprising 17 cases involving ten 10 closed Microfinance Banks [MFBs], in which 15 former directors of the said MFBs were involved.
It also reviewed two cases of closed Deposit Money Banks [DMBs] involving their former Directors:
“One of the closed DMBs cases currently under prosecution was FRN vs. Prince Adekunle Adeyeba & Others where the accused persons being erstwhile directors of the closed Gulf Bank of Nigeria Plc. were facing trial over banking malpractices involving N15.1 billion of depositors funds in that closed bank.
“The Task Force also reviewed about 16 criminal cases being prosecuted under the Failed Banks Act in which prosecution had been stalled as a result of the fact that the accused persons in those cases had jumped bail and had absconded from the country in the heat of their investigation and prosecution. The sureties that took them on bail had also disappeared.
“The Task Force noted that some of those accused persons had sneaked back into the country in the hope that their prosecutions might have been terminated. It is against this backdrop that the Task Force gave the notice that such accused persons would be re-arrested and prosecuted to serve as a warning to other bank offenders, adding that the Task Force would leave no stone unturned to ensure that erring bank offenders were brought to book.”
The Failed Banks [Recovery of Debts] and Financial Malpractices in Banks Act 1994 [Failed Banks Act] was promulgated to recover debts owed to failed banks which had remained outstanding as at the date the banks were closed or declared failed and to prosecute directors and officers of licensed banks who had committed banking malpractices.
In July 1995, the Inspector General of Police established a special police unit called the Failed Banks Inquiry to assist the NDIC and the Central Bank of Nigeria implement the criminal aspects of the Failed Banks Act through investigation of criminal complaints referred to the Unit by the Regulatory Authorities.