LAGOS — LAGOS— Vanguard , your best-read newspaper, 23 March 2009,
did a world exclusive on alleged plot by a group of individuals to
take over five banks in the country.
Two weeks ago, the new Central Bank of
Nigeria Governor, Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi sacked the chief
executives and boards of five banks, therefore confirming our scoop
of March 23.
The story:ANTI-CONSOLIDATION forces have regrouped with the hope of
dismantling the structures and forcing a takeover of the top five
banks in the country, Vanguard can now reveal. The grand plan by the
group is to cause panic and uncertainty in the industry and make the
target banks look unsafe for depositors
Meantime, indications emerged yesterday that the Federal Government
may announce the names of a new Governor of the Central Bank (CBN)
and the Auditor-General of the Federation (AGF) in April just a few
weeks before the tenure of the incumbents run out.
However, the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) has expressed concern
over what it described as the rapidly deteriorating liquidity
situation in the banking industry and tasked the Central Bank (CBN)
to make public information on causes of the development as well as
the scale of the crisis.
Vanguard investigations revealed that the aim of the
anti-consolidation forces is to cause loss of public confidence in
the banking industry and compel the Federal Government to move in by
injecting funds. Further, they ultimately plan to nstigate
government to take equity holdings in the targeted banks.
Vanguard gathered that the group at work is made up of former bank
owners who lost out during the consolidation exercise, a powerful
clique in the present government, and some aggrieved persons in
three of the six geopolitical zones in the country who felt left out
in the consolidation exercise.
Presidency sources disclosed that those who felt left out in the
consolidation exercise are up in arms to recoup what they felt they
lost during Obasanjo years.
Part of the plans hatched by the group is to ensure that the
incumbent Governor of the Central Bank, Professor Chukwuma Soludo,
does not get a second term. The plan is also to ensure that whatever
gains consolidation recorded are discredited.
This, it was learnt, was meant to force the President to act
quickly in the matter of appointment of a successor to Soludo as
they anticipate that the president’s slow move may scuttle their
dreams and cause the renewal of Soludo’s re-appointment for a second
term.
The group’s second game plan is to make Nigerian banks look unsafe
in the eye of the banking public. Part of the game is to spread
rumours that some banks are unsound and are on the verge of
collapse. They send out text messages to individuals and account
holders passing wrong information on their target banks. At the
moment, the group’s target is one of the high-flying new generation
banks where they have sent out several messages.
New CBN Gov, Auditor-General to emerge April
The tenure of the CBN Governor, Professor Chukwuma Soludo and
Auditor-General of the Federation, Mr. O. R. Ejenavi from Delta
State will lapse in May 2009.
Naming nominees for the top jobs, according to a presidency source,
will afford the Senate ample opportunity to work on them before they
assume office.
While Soludo will complete his first term in office as CBN governor
by May 29, Ejenavi will be due for retirement on age grounds on May
18.
However, among those being considered for the position of CBN
governor include the Minister of National Planning, Dr Shamsuddeen
Usman from Kano, who was a former Finance minister and deputy
governor at the apex bank; another former CBN deputy governor,
Obadiah Mailafia from Nassarawa, Mallam Isa Hayatudeen from Borno, a
former managing director of FSB International Bank, incumbent
Managing Director of First Bank, Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, also
from Kano, and Mallam Falalu Bello from Kaduna, Managing Director,
Unity Bank.
But the most touted name so far is that of Mallam Isa Yuguda, the
Bauchi State governor who won election on the platform of the All
Nigeria peoples Party, ANPP, but defected to the ruling PDP last
week. Yuguda is also an in-law of President Umaru Yar’Adua. Yuguda
was also a former Managing Director of Inland Bank, a legacy bank in
post-consolidation FinBank.
Past CBN governors include late Dr. Clement Isong (Akwa-Ibom),
Alhaji Adamu Ciroma (Yobe); Mr. Ola Vincent (Lagos), late Alhaji
Abdulkadir Ahmed (Bauchi); Mr. Paul Ogwuma (Abia), Dr. Joseph Sanusi
(Ondo) and the current Professor Charles Soludo (Anambra).
It was also gathered that strict obedience to civil service rules
will be observed in the appointment of a new Auditor General for the
Federation going by the constitutional provision.
Section 86 Subsection 1 of the 1999 constitution states: “the
Auditor-General for the Federation shall be appointed by the
President on the recommendation of the Federal Civil Service
Commission, subject to the confirmation of the Senate.”
That of the CBN may be determined by other factors, mostly
political considerations which are at the pleasure of the President
without recourse to the commission.
The most senior director in the office of the Auditor-General
currently is Mr. Ogunsina G.F from Ekiti State who may be appointed
unless there is political maneuvering. Having been a director since
2004, it may not be smooth sailing for Ogunsina because, there is
another senior civil servant Mr. Osonuga T. A. from Ogun State who
was promoted a director in 2007 and is being propelled by other
forces to occupy the office.
A CBN official who spoke on condition of anonymity said that it is
unfortunate that top five banks are the target. The banks, he said,
are sound. The CBN had mistaken in the past the ongoing move as
de-marketing by competitors in the banking industry, saying it is
unhealthy competition.
The group is using this means to make depositors panic and
undertake massive withdrawal of funds from the targeted banks in an
attempt to cause liquidity problem in the bank. In that state they
hope to cause a take over by the government which may buy a stake in
the bank and later sell to members of the privileged group who may
be appointed in the interim into the board of the banks.
Arewa worries over liquidity problem
However, the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) expressed concern over
what it described as the rapidly deteriorating liquidity situation
in the banking industry and tasked the Central Bank (CBN) to inform
the people the cause of the development as well as the scale of the
crisis.
ACF said that the commercial banks must have obviously lent too
much money to people who either invested them in buying stocks or in
the importation of petroleum products in the country, but are unable
to repay such loans.
A statement signed by the National Publicity Secretary of the
Forum, Mr. Anthony Sani however blamed the CBN for enquiring “into
the volume of the so-called toxic assets of the commercial banks
while refusing to tell Nigerians how or why in the first place, the
banks found themselves in trouble.
The statement reads “The Working Committee of the National
Executive Council of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) held its
meeting at its national headquarters in Kaduna on Tuesday, the 17th
of March 2009. In attendance were all National officers of the ACF
drawn from the 19 northern states and the Federal Capital Territory
(FCT). General IBM Haruna, the Chairman presided.
“Among other things, the meeting reviewed and discussed a number of
issues and other troubling developments in the country. At the end,
it resolved to issue the following statement.
“The ACF deliberated on the rapidly deteriorating liquidity
situation in the banking industry and observed that Nigerians are
feeling increasingly frustrated by the failure of the Central Bank
of Nigeria (CBN) to disclose the true the true nature and the scale
of the crisis.
“Even members of the National Assembly, despite their best efforts,
have been unable to get to the truth of the matter.
According to Arewa consultative forum “All that seem obvious is that
our commercial banks had lent out too much money to too many people
who had invested them in stocks or petroleum importation but who are
now unable to pay back. Beyond that, the public has no clear idea as
how or why the loans were given and on what terms.”