Fresh documents obtained by SaharaReporters on the badly mismanaged InterContinental Bank of Nigeria reveal that Aigbovigse I. Aig-Imokhuede, a key player in the sale of the troubled bank, still owes InterContinental Bank N16 billion—even as the Central Bank of Nigeria and Access Bank shareholders have finalized the merger of the two banks, giving Access Bank 75% ownership of InterContinental Bank. The loan documents show that Mr. Aig-Imokhuede and Herbert Wigwe, as the Director and CEO respectively of Access Bank and also co-owners of United Alliance Company, borrowed a total of N16.3 billion from InterContinental Bank as of May 31, 2009. The loan was to be repaid in 36 months.
However, once the cash was released to the company, the debtors defaulted on their loans. As the CBN began its clampdown on financial recklessness in the banking sector, the apex bank ran an advertorial August 18 2009, categorizing Mr. Aig-Imokhuede’s United Alliance Company’s loan from InterContinental Bank as a “non-performing” loan. The CBN also said that Mr. Herbert Wigwe and Mr. Aig-Imokhuede’s debts were some of the largest loans. However, promises by the CBN to keep publishing the names of defaulters until they paid has not materialized. A source within the apex bank told SaharaReporters that the CBN came under strong political pressure to stop publishing defaulters’ names. As if in response to the CBN’s publication, InterContinental Bank wrote a letter to United Alliance in November 2009 offering to reschedule the company’s loans having reduced it to N10.39 billion. It remains unclear whether Mr. Imokhuede repaid part of the loan. However, relatively new documents—dating from as recently as June 2011—show that United Alliance Company could not fulfill its repayment obligations to InterContinental Bank. Instead, the company kept making numerous requests for extension of time to make payments. A letter signed by United’s CEO Chiozoba Ufoeze in June 2011 requested a 30-day extension to repay some N1.3 billion that was due on July 7th 2011. SaharaReporters learnt that the request for extension was a second in the series of defaults in repayments of the loans after a repayment schedule had been established between the two entities. Another letter submitted by United Alliance on March 20 2011 had requested a shift in repayment dates due to what the debtors claimed was cash flow constraints. What remains curious in this case was that Access Bank, which is also owned and controlled by Aig-Imokuede and Herbert Wigwe, were negotiating a take-over of InterContinental Bank, a bank formerly run by Erastus Akingbola, one of Nigeria’s worst rogue bankers and a pastor of the Redeemed Christian Church of God. Several banking sources told SaharaReporters that Mr. Aig-Imokhuede and Herbert Wigwe were variants of Mr. Akingbola in the way they too mismanaged their banks. “The fact that those two men were never arrested by the EFCC is something that continues to puzzle many of us in the banking sector,” a top banking analyst told our correspondent. Another added, “There is no doubt that Chief Aig-Imokhuede and Herbert Wigwe have questions to answer about the many questionable deals in their bank,” wondering “why are they being rewarded instead of being made to pay for their financial shenanigans?” An investor in the troubled InterContinental Bank said he remains worried that the duo of Aig-Imokhuede and Wigwe are being cleared to take over a bank they helped ruined by defaulting on massive loans they took from it. The investor added that he feared that the glaring shady repayment arrangements between the distressed bank and the two men would be now be foreclosed by the merger of both banks. SaharaReporters texted questions to CBN authorities to ascertain whether United Alliance Company, co-owned by Aig-Imokhuede and Wigwe, had pre-paid the loans it borrowed from InterContinental Bank before the apex bank gave its clearance for the controversial merger to proceed. The CBN did not respond to our inquiry.
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